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Or 


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REESE  LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 
Class 


Political  Socialism,- 


WOULD  IT  FAIL  IN  SUCCESS? 


A  BOOK  FOR 
BUSY   MEN 


SECOND  EDITION 


'Can  the  Poor  Be  Made  Rich  by 
Making  the  Rich  Poor?" 


POLITICAL  SOCIALISM, 

Would  It  Fafl  in  Success? 


A  BOOK  FOR  BUSY  MEN 

BY 
J.  S.  CRAWFORD 

SECOND  EDITION 


"Can  the  Poor  be  made  rich  by  making  the  Tfc/cA  poor  P" 


PUBLISHED  and  SOLD 

by 
THE  WRITER 

•Price,  pott  pn  paiJ.  25  cent* 


COPYRIGHT,    1910, 

BY 
J.  S.  CRAWFORD. 


Query:—  A  system  that  proposes  to  overturn  securities  ;  to 
abolish  profit,  rent,  and  interest  ;  to  overthrow  credit,  bonds. 
mortgages,  life-insurance,  corporate  titles,  and  commercial 
paper;,  to  support  the  human  family  on  five  hours  work  a  day,— 
five  days  a  week,  workers  between  the  ages  of  seventeen  and 
forty-six  only:—  Should  not  such  a  system  give  some  guaranty 
that  it  would  succeed  ?  Is  the  endorsement  of  sensational  news- 
papers and  magazines,  opulent  in  "Screamers"  and  "Scare- 
heads"  only,  a  sufficient  guaranty  ?  Sworn  official  reports  of 
corporations,  under  the  Income  Tax  sections  of  the  New  Tariff 
law,  show  dividends  less  than  three  per  cent.  Lest  we  floun- 
der. is  there  not  sore  need  of  a  Guide,—  A  true  Finger  pointing? 

Again  .-—Gladly  admitting  that,  with  a  sneer  and  an  epithet, 
the  Socialist  can  no  longer  be  dismissed  as  an  Anarchist,  -as 
the  mere  -Echo  of  poor,  proud,  disordered,  Old  Pierre  Joseph 
Proudhon  crying  Equality!  Misery!  that  the  issue  must  be 
shifted  to  solid  ground,  clearly  framed,  and,  in  the  light  of  rea- 
son, fairly  discussed  ;—  that  the  average  Socialist  is  well  read. 
earnest,  aggressive,  and  ardent  in  debate  ;  -  that  he  is  less 
dangerous  than  the  Sensationalist  who.  responsible  for  noth- 
ing, attacks  everybody  and  everything  ;  all  of  which  admitted 
the  question  still  comes  :  -  Does  the  Socialist  clearly  perceive 
the  difference  between  witting  in  a  library  and  -working  in 
an  office  ?  between  figuring  on  a  job  and  getting  the  order 
for  a  job  ?  between  signing  a  pay-roll  and  walking  the  floor 
at  mght  to  make  the  payroll  good  ?  between  plowing  at  a 
desk  and  plowing  in  a  field  ?  between  confiscation  and 
compensation  ?  (is  the  first  just  or  the  second  possible?  'j-in 
short,  is  the  Socialist  practical? 

Again:—  Referring  to  Competition,  Socialists  say  that,  of 
business  men.  seven  eighths  go  into  bankruptcy  because  of 
small  profits;  while  of  wage-workers,  they  say  seven-eighths 
live  in  poverty  because  of  large  profits.  Reconcile  ?  In  Men 
ana  Mules,  Mr.  Ries  contends  that  a  wage-worker  earns  $3500 
a  year  and  gets  less  than  $500.  Then  why  not  co-operate  ? 
There  is  no  law  against.—  Is  it  not  true  that  Socialists  ignore 
the  fact  that  true  men  gratify  themselves  by  gratifying  others. 
and,  if  in  good.  conpaijy^ai  times,  enjoy  being  alone?-  See 
pjUi«lpIcs  of  tl.i«t  tore-did:  Individualist,  William  Godwin. 
Bi»t.*by  accentuating  tfte  'Social-State,  do  not  Socialists  pro- 
ceed upon  a  principle  derogatory  fcfthe  individual,—  his  primacy 
3n$  pnv-icy?  a.id  in  H.erojrat'cn  of  tlje  family.—  its  primacy  and 


,  _  .....« 

"Again:—  Do  not  the  last  message  of  President  Taft.  Decem- 
ber, 1910.  and  the  transactions  of  the  preceding  administration 
confirm  what  is  said  in  this  book,  viz.:  that  public  business 
is  done  at  greater  cost  than  private  business? 


UNITED  EVANGBUCAX.  PRBSS, 
HARRISBURG,  PA. 


POLITICAL  SOCIALISM,— WHY  IT  WOULD  FAIL 

INDULGENT  READER: 

If  these  preliminary  pages  be  read  without  profit,  have 
done  with  the  book,  and  let  it  be  cast  straightway  into  the 
waste-basket.  You  are  aware,  Noble  Sir,  that  we  are 
confronted  with  a  live  question,—  a  growing,  forceful 
question, — one,  all-embracing,  attractive,  yea  fascinating, 
and  not  altogether  devoid  of  mystery.  Shall  we  not 
proceed  to  consider  it  as  becomes  a  citizen,  patiently, 
and  wisely?  Shall  we  not  seek  to  define,  to  discuss,  to 
comprehend,  to  judge,  in  the  spirit  of  a  Christian  gen- 
tleman? As  the  question  is  economic  it  is  thought  best 
to  proceed  by  a  method  not  unfamiliar  to  the  politician : 

WHEREAS  : 

Certain  Finger-Boards, — in  a  figurative  sense, — point 
toward  the  certain  failure  of  a  Socialist-State;  there- 
fore, the  purpose  herein  is  to  indicate: 

1.  That,  State- Socialism  would  fail  because  the  busi- 
ness of  the  country  is  so  widely  diversified  and   the   j 
amount  of  productive  industry  so  great,  that  the  joint-    «* 
volume  of  this  industry  and  business,  centralized  under 
the  control  of  a  proprietary  government,  would  be  un- 
wielding  and  unmanageable.     Moreover,  some  branches 

of  industry  are  yet  formative  while  others  are  antagon- 
istic. 

2.  That,   State-Socialism   would  fail  because  to  vest 
this  prodigious  joint-volume  of  business  and  industry, 
in  tht  hands  of  politicians  and  theorists  would  multiply 
the  opportunities  for  graft; — the  more  Official  Depart- 
ments, Bureaus,  Divisions,  Commissions,  Clerkships,  and 
Executive  Machinery ;  the  more  supervisors,  bosses,  sub- 
bosses,  foremen,  chiefs,  commissioners,  directors,  detec- 
tives,   secretaries,    and    other    executive    officers; — the 

Hi 


218553 


iv  POUTICAI,  SOCIALISM, — 

more  opportunities  for  connivance,  conspiracy  and  cor- 
ruption; 

3.  That,  State-Socialism  would  fail  because  its  aim  is 
to  organize  politics  and  business  upon  the  same  basis. 
This  union  of  politics  and  business  would  open  the  door 
for  extravagance  and  abuse  of  patronage.    Under  such 
a  system  it  would  be  difficult  to  defeat  a  party  in  power 
or  to  dislodge  a  party-boss.     This  is  not  to  say  that 
Socialists  are  more  dishonest  than  other  people.    It  is 
to  say  that  a  majority  of  workmen  would  combine  to 
elect  a  shop-man  to  be  a  shop-boss,  by  the  same  methods 
employed  now  to  elect  a  ward-politician  to  be  a  ward- 
spoilsman. 

4.  That,    State-Socialism   would   fail   because    it   as- 
sumes that  all  shops,  mills,  farms,  mines,  factories,  and 
public  utilities,  run  at  a  profit, — and  that,  a  great  profit. 
But,  truth  to  be  tolc!',  the  n umber  ofTnen,  who  fail  in 
business,   equals  the   number   who   succeed.      Many   a 
Captain  of  Industry  walks  the  floor  at  night,  contriving 
to   meet   his   pay-roll.      In    the    Socialist- State,    Labor 
would  have  this  loss  to  bear. 

5.  That,  State-Socialism  would  fail  because,  contrary 
to  fact,  it  assumes  that  there  would  be  no  antagonisms. 
Instance  the  shoemaker,   granting  that  the   shoe   is  a 
"social  product." — The  man  who  would  do  one-sixtieth 
of  the  work  in  producing  a  shoe,  might  honestly  insist 
that  he  would  do  one-fortieth  and  demand  one-fortieth 
of  the  proceeds.     Countless  disputes  and  contradictions 
would  thus  arise  and  ramify  through  the  countless  com- 
plications  of   a    State's   industry   and   business.     Who 
could  tell  the  fraction  of  a  shoe  belonging  to  the  wood- 
chopper  who  would  fell  the  tree  to  make  shoe-pegs? 
Who  could  reconcile  the  interests  of  both  parties  to  an 
exchange  of  commodities?   or,  of  the  buyer  and   the 


WHY  IT   WOULD  FAIL  V 

seller  ?  or,  of  the  consumer  and  the  producer  ?  or,  of  the 
home  manufacturer  and  the  importer  of  a  like  product? 
— Answer :  Arbitrary  Power  only :  Despotism ! 

6.  That,  State-Socialism  would  fail  because  in  the  So- 
cialist-State no  man  "would  own  his  job."     All  jobs 
would  belong  to  the  State.    Liberty  would  be  a  myth 
and  freedom  a  mockery. 

7.  That,  State- Socialism  would  fail  because  it  assumes 
that  a  general,  public  interest  is  stronger  than  a  self- 
regarding,  private  interest.    £.  g.  take  Agriculture:    It 
assumes  that  the  Book-Farmer,  theoretical  and  non-pos- 
sessing, would  be  more  efficient  than  the  Field-Farmer 
who,  as  proprietor  and  possessor  in  fee-simple,  operates 
the  farm.     It  assumes  that  a  government-agent  would 
rotate    crops;    pick    out    seed-corn;    select    male-pigs; 
operate  a  4-horse  self-binder,  and  reap  a  field  of  grain, 
down,  lodged,  or  swailed,  better  than  the  owner  whose 
first  work  was  doing  chores  at  the  barn  and  whose  sole 
ambition  is  to  succeed,  counting  success  from  the  farm- 
er's standpoint. 

8.  That,  State-Socialism  would  fail  because  it  seeks 
to  destroy  competition.    Now,  competition  attracts,  en- 
livens, stimulates,  and  develops.    It  embellishes  and  ad- 
vertises.   It  urges.    If  competition  be  eliminated,  shop- 
windows  will  go  undressed.    Store-fronts  will  not  be  il- 
luminated.    Electric    signs    will    not   flash    in   esthetic 
rivalry  from  house-tops,  hills  and  road-ways.     Goods 
will  then  be  stored  in  long,  dull  ware-houses  and  dis- 
tributed  by   indifferent    state-agents.     The    State    will 
make  the  goods,  determine  the  quality,  fix  the  styles, 
set  the  fashions,  and  control  distribution.    Moreover,  it 
is  not  necessary  to  overturn  the  government  in  order  to 
do  away  with  competition  and  its  evils  if  any  there  be. 
Voluntary  co-operation,  the  Industrial  Democracy,  of 


VI  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM,— 

Dr.  Abbott  can  do  that.  There  is  no  law  to  prevent  and 
no  custom  to  estop.  If  a  voluntary,  Co-operative 
Democracy  can  manufacture  goods  and  put  them  on  the 
market  cheaper  and  better  than  Competition,  it  is  at  lib- 
erty to  do  so. 

9.  That,  State-Socialism  would  fail  because  Material- 
ism cannot  satisfy  human  nature: 

My  Good  Sir,  is  it  not  true  that  the  human  mind 
is  something  more  than  "a  mechanism  of  meat?" 

Is  it  not  true  that  the  sentiment  of  patriotism  is  some- 
thing more  than  "the  refuge  of  a  scoundrel  ?" 

Is  it  not  true  that  the  institution  of  marriage  is  some- 
thing more  than  a  "civil  contract?" 

Is  it  not  true  that  there  is  something  more  to  educa- 
tion than  instruction, — "the  pouring-in  process?"  Con- 
sider gravely:  Would  it  be  well  to  put  the  training  of 
children,  the  printing  of  books,  the  publishing  of  news- 
papers, solely  in  the  hands  of  a  Socialist-State?  In 
olden  time,  it  was  enough  to  train-up  a  child  in  the 
way  he  should  go.  But  in  these  times,  there  is  sore 
need  to  strengthen  the  boy's  will  that  he  may  restrain 
his  feet  from  the  path  in  which  he,  should  not  go. 

Is  it  not  true  that  the  law  of  inheritance  is  something 
more  than  "a  property  right  ?"  Does  it  not  promote  and 
protect  the  integrity  of  the  family? 

In  this  book,  it  is  held  that  property-rights  are  axio- 
matic; that  the  right  to  buy  land,  build  a  house,  raise 
a  crop,  rear  a  family,  defend  established  order,  and  ad- 
vance by  formative  methods,  is  self-evident  and  self- 
executing.  This  right  can  no  more  be  proven  than 
2  -f-  3  =  5:  attempted  proof  confuses  only. 

10.  That,  State-Socialism  would  fail  because  Society 
cannot  be  regenerated  except  as  the  man  is  regenerated. 
Socialism  ignores  the  man  and  regards  the  mass.     It 


WHY   IT   WOULD   FAIL  Vli 

ignores  causes  and  regards  effects.  It  condemns  and 
criticizes  the  whole  but  excuses  the  parts.  It  reverses. — 
Socialism  substitutes  "Class  Consciousness"  for  class 
conscience.  It  substitutes  the  tyranny  of  Capital  for 
the  tyranny  of  Truth.  It  lays  blame  on  Capital  and  the 
Mass  for  crime,  misery,  weakness,  poverty,  and  stupid- 
ity. It  releases  the  individual  of  responsibility.  It 
blames  all,  acquits  each:  indicts  everybody,  convicts  no- 
body. It  would  fail  for : 

It  is  better  to  be  true  than  false ; 
Better  to  be  wise  than  foolish ; 
Better  to  be  brave  than  a  coward. 

Hath  it  not  been  said  by  that  noblest  Master  of  the 
Human  Mind,  "Prove  all  things,  hold  fast  to  that  which 
is  good?"  Yea,  verily,  "the  Lord  made  this  world,  not 
the  Devil."  There  is  such  a  thing  as  moral  force. 

Note  i.  There  is  misapprehension  in  the  public  mind 
as  to  just  what  Political  Socialism  stands  for.  Many 
otherwise  well-read  men  think  of  it  as  unfriendly  to 
Capital  and  that  it  demands  an  equal  division  of  prop- 
erty— neither  of  which  is  true:  Something  worse. 

Note  2.  It  has  not  escaped  attention  that  but  few  so- 
cialist votes  are  required  in  the  Congress  to  control  the 
balance  of  power  and  thus  to  force  complications,  con- 
cessions, and  compromises.  In  the  5th  Wisconsin  dis- 
trict, Victor  L.  Berger,  a  Socialist,  has  already  been 
elected.  In  a  number  of  legislative  districts,  notably  in 
Wisconsin,  Minnesota,  Massachusetts,  Oregon,  and  New 
Jersey,  Socialists  have  been  elected.  Berks  County  is 
one  of  the  strongest  agricultural  communities  in  the 
United  States,  yet  in  the  Reading  district  of  that  county, 
Mr.  Maurer,  a  Socialist,  was  elected  to  a  legislative  seat, 
in  the  conservative  old  Commonwealth  of  Pennsylvania ; 
— the  reason  for  this  is  that  self-constituted  reformers 
and  so-called  Independent  Press,  with  magazine  writers 
and  editors,  ever  alert  for  the  evil  and  peculiar,  have 
succeeded  in  un-settling  the  public  mind.  These  men 
whose  fathers,  (perhaps  yet  living),  may  have  worked 


Vlii  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM, — 

thirteen  hours  a  day  for  thirteen  dollars  a  month,  have 
partially  disintegrated  the  old  political  parties.  These 
agitators  lack  composure.  They  lack  faith  in  self-acting 
and  self-executing  principles.  They  have  no  patience 
with  formative  progress.  It  must  be  revolutionary  and 
reformatory.  After  a  time,  probably  after  some  mis- 
chief will  have  been  done,  some  blood  shed,  this  spirit 
of  disintegration  and  disquietude  will  run  its  course. 

Note  3.  As  to  whether  Socialists,  in  effect,  apologize 
for  crime,  the  reader  is  referred  to  Jno.  W.  Slayton's 
recent  booklet :  Criminology,  Crime  and  Criminals.  Mr. 
Slayton  was  the  recent  socialist  candidate  for  governor 
of  Pennsylvania.  A  discerning  man  must  discriminate 
between  Law  without  love  and  Love  without  law,  maud- 
lin sentiment,  it  is  called.  The  latter,  in  opulent  ex- 
travagance, carries  roses  and  poetry  to  the  jail-cell  of 
the  most  willful,  degenerated,  and  hardened  of  crimi- 
nals. It  would  be  diffcult  for  Mr.  Slayton  to  add  an- 
other to  his  armful  of  bouquets.  The  "All  and  Singu- 
lar" of  old  law-writers  is  cast  aside.  Perversion  of  the 
"All"  and  not  propensity  of  the  "Singular"  accounts  for 
crime.  Outward  conditions  not  inward  produce  the 
thief — this,  I  call,  a  dangerous  doctrine. 

Note  4.  "But,  behold,  the  post  office!"  cry  our  social- 
ist devotees.  Yes:  Run  at  a  loss;  whereas,  by  con- 
tract it  could  be  run  at  a  profit.  And,  mark  you  an 
example: — No  sooner  do  French  letter-carriers  go  in 
from  one  strike,  than  French  railway  clerks  go  put  on 
another.  Besides,  who  more  indolent,  indifferent,  incom- 
petent, and  inconsequential,  than  civil-service  office-hold- 
ers living  on  their  uppers,  money  squandered  for  cara- 
mels and  limerick,  pleading  to  Congress  always  for  a 
pension  and  more  pay? — Who  struck  poor  Casey  out? 
is  past  finding  out  Vain  quest  of  the  Socialist.  But 
happily,  at  the  very  next  chance,  Casey  made  a  hit ;  he 
scored,  and  a  Capitalist  forthwith  put  him  into  a  higher 
league.  Poor  Casey  never  bothered  his  head  about 
how  long  a  visionary  man  may  live  on  "pigeon's  milk." 

With  these  Fingers  pointing,  shall  we  not,  from 
Casey's  standpoint,  proceed  "to  launch  out  into  the 
deep,"  sounding  Socialism  to  the  very  bottom? 

Cherokee,  Iowa,  1911.  J.  S.  CRAWFORD. 


REMARKS  INSPIRED  BY  THE  SOCIALIST 
VICTORY  IN  MILWAUKEE 

PRESIDENT  TAFT  on  the  Attack  on  Private  Property : 

"Of  the  future  I  shall  say  nothing,  1  ecause  you  would 
say  I  was  making  a  political  speech.  All  that  I  can 
say  is  that  the  issue  that  is  being  framed,  as  it  seems  to 
me,  is  the  issue  with  respect  to  the  institution  of  private 
property.  There  are  those  who  charge  to  that  institu- 
tion the  corporate  abuses,  the  unequal  distribution  of 
property,  the  poverty  of  some,  and  the  undue  wealth  of 
others,  and,  therefore,  say:  'We  shall  have  none  of  it; 
we  must  have  a  new  rule  of  distribution.'  This,  for  the 
want  of  a  better  name,  we  shall  call  SpCIALISM." 
Speech  at  Ada,  Ohio,  June  2,  1910,  and  iterated,  next 
day,  at  Jackson,  Michigan. 

When  he  uttered  these  prophetic  words,  no  doubt, 
the  President  had  in  mind  the  results  of  the  recent 
municipal  election  in  Milwaukee. 


Hon.  WILLIAM  SULZER,  Democratic  Congressman  from 
New  York,  in  a  recent  speech  said: 

"I  am  not  a  Socialist  but  I  am  an  individualist.  I 
would  preserve  the  identity  of  the  individual  at  all 
hazards.  I  would  not  have  all  men  on  a  dead  level  for 
that  is  what  Socialism  would  have.  I  would  have  each 
man  stand  distinct,  forging  ahead,  one  in  competion 
with  the  other,  and  all  trying  to  press  forward,  in  the 
righteous  way  to  the  goal  of  human  aspiration." 


A.     M.     SIMONS,    Socialist-Leader,    at    the    Socialist- 
Congress,  in  Chicago,  May  14,  I9IO»  sa^: 

"You  might  as  well  try  to  change  the  orbit  of  the 
comet  as  to  win  without  the  farmers." 


CONTENTS 


POLITICAL  SOCIALISM,— IS  IT  GAINING  OR 

LOSING  GROUND  ? Page  5 

FALLING  BACK  FROM  UTOPIA,  THE  FIRST  RETREAT.— A 
MARXIAN  CONTRADICTION,  THE  SECOND  RETREAT.— VIO- 
LENCE REPUDIATED,  ANOTHER  RETREAT. — CONCESSION  TO 
PERSONAL  LIBERTY  AND  PRIVATE  PROPERTY,  THE  FOURTH 
RETREAT.— ARE  THESE  RETREATS  A  CONCESSION  TO  ES- 
TABLISHED ORDER? 

POLITICAL    SOCIALISM,— WHAT    IS    LEFT,    A 
LOSING  OR  SAVING  REMNANT?     .    Page  S3 

A  RESUME.— CARL  SCHURZ  ON  KARL  MARX.— SOCIALISTIC 
CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE.— THE  CLASS-WAR.— SUR- 
PLUS VALUE.— DOGMA  ILLUSTRATED  BY  INDIANS  MAK- 
ING SUN-DRIED  BRICK.— MARX  STOOD  FOR  GOLD  MONEY. 
— EXTRAVAGANCE  OF  GOVERNMENT. — MAYOR  SEIDEL — 
ALDRICH  AND  SHAW  QUOTED. — TYRANNY  OF  SOCIALISM. 
— SHOPS  DISMAL. — STORES  TURNED  INTO  WAREHOUSES. 
— NO  FASHIONS. — NO  ADVERTISING. — THE  SAVING 
REMNANT. 

POLITICAL  SOCIALISM,— SHALL  IT  BE  PUT 

ON  THE  DEFENSE?    HOW?    .    .    .    Page  67 

THE  FARMER,  THE  HOME-OWNER,  THE  LABOR-UNIONS, 
IN  PART,  AGAINST  SOCIALISM.— STRONG  SENSE  OF  PRO- 
PRIETORSHIP.—SOCIALISM  OF  THE  CHAIR  HAS  NO  SYM- 
PATHY FOR  THE  CAPTAIN  OF  INDUSTRY  AND  THE 
SCHOOL  OF  HARD-KNOCKS. 

POLITICAL  SOCIALISM,— WHAT  DO  NON- 
SOCIALISTS  SAY  OF  IT  ?     .    .    .    .      Page  88 

A  REVIEW  OF  THE  STRENGTH,  ORGANIZATION  AND  INFLU- 
ENCE OF  GERMAN,  FRENCH,  BRITISH,  AND  AMERICAN 
SOCI ALI S  M . — NO  M  ENCLATURE  REVOLUTION  ARY. — RED 

FLAG,  THE  EMBLEM  OF  BLOOD. — SOCIALISM  FLOURISHES 
ONLY  IN  RICH  COUNTRIES. — AMBITION  AND  APPETITE. — 
PLAYING  WITH  REVOLUTIONARY  FIRE. — THE  BROKEN 
WINE  CASK.— PASSION  FOR  BLOOD,  ONE  THOUSAND 
BURIED  IN  A  SINGLE  GRAVE,— MEETING  OF  REVOLUTION- 
ARY SOCIALISTS  DESCRIBED.— CONCLUSION. 


POLITICAL  SOCIALISM; 

A  Busy  Man's  Book. 

Preliminary  Note: 

Readers  not  familiar  with  the  literature  of  Socialism 
are  advised  to  read  the  second  half  of  this  book  first, 
beginning  at  page  67;  this,  because  the  incidental 
and  descriptive  features  of  the  subject  are  novel  and 
wonderfully  attractive.  Readers  familiar  with  the  ele- 
mental and  organic  features  of  Socialism  are  advised 
to  follow  the  order  of  the  book;  this,  because  the  first 
half  is  critical  and  controversial,  developing  the  princi- 
ples in  which  the  last  half  strikes  root.  Comments  m- 
vited;  Address,  Cherokee,  Iowa. 


CHAPTER  I. 

POLITICAL  SOCIALISM—IS  IT  GAINING  OR 
LOSING  GROUND? 

PALLING  BACK  FROM  UTOPIA,  THE  FIRST  RETREAT.— A 
MARXIAN  CONTRADICTION,  THE  SECOND  RETREAT. — VIO- 
LENCE REPUDIATED,  ANOTHER  RETREAT. — CONCESSION  TO 
PERSONAL  LIBERTY  AND  PRIVATE  PROPERTY,  THE  FOURTH 
RETREAT. — ARE  THESE  RETREATS  A  CONCESSION  TO  ES- 
TABLISHED ORDER? 

An  English  thinker  recently  quoted  with  ap- 
proval these  discerning  and  attractive  words: 
"Social  life  is  to  personality  what  language  is 


O  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

to  thought."  *  I  accept  that  thesis  for  the  sake 
of  the  side-light  which  it  throws  upon  the  treat- 
ment of  my  subjects :  Is  Philosophic  and  Politi- 
cal Socialism  gaining  or  losing  ground? 

Statistics  give  a  ready  but  superficial  answer. 
The  vital  and  persistent  force  in  such  a  move- 
ment must  be  measured  by  its  elemental  aspects ; 
by  its  mental  and  moral  loyalty  to  itself;  by  its 
persuasive  and  convincing  harmony  with  facts 
of  human  nature ;  by  its  consistent,  confident,  and 
spontaneous  power  of  appeal ;  by  its  skill  in  meet- 
ing criticism; — it  is  by  such  as  these  that  the 
growth  or  decline  of  this  thing  called  the  New 
Social  Order  is  to  be  gauged.  A  few  votes  here 
or  there,  more  or  less,  signify  very  little  in  the 
developing  stages  of  so  revolutionary  and  so 
comprehensive  a  system.  It  will  be  seen  at  once 
that  the  inquiry  pursued  from  these  subjective 
standpoints  is  a  very  different  matter  from 
adducing  and  arranging  comparative  tables  of 
statistics, — a  matter,  too,  not  without  difficulty, 
strongly  demanding  discernment  and  discrimina- 
tion. 

With  open  minds,  then,  we  proceed  to  ascer- 
tain whether  systematic  and  contemporary 
Socialism,  in  principle,  is  gaining  or  losing 
ground. 

•Baldwin  Lectures ;  Th«  Crisis  in  Unbelief  by  R.  M.  Wenley,  1909, 
p.  S47. 


A  BUSY   MAN  S  BOOK  7 

FORSAKING  UTOPIA 

Let  the  inquiry  first  be  as  to  the  Ideal  State 
which  Socialism  proposes. 

At  times  for  more  than  two  thousand  years, 
there  have  arisen  philosophers  and  philanthro- 
pists appealing  with  noblest  purpose,  to  the  imag- 
inations of  man.  They  have  painted  rich  pictures 
of  social  life  in  a  certain,  civil  State  of  Perfection 
attained  in  islands  in  the  sea,  or  in  cities  in  the 
sun,  or  in  grottoes  in  the  earth,  or  in  the  future. 
The  plans  of  Oceana,  Atlantis,  Icaria,  Hulee, 
Cite  du  Soleil,  Vril-ya,  Leviathan,  Ideal  Repub- 
lic, Harmony,  New  Harmony,  Merrie  England, 
Modern  Utopia,  United  States  of  Europe,  Ere- 
whon,  Zion  City,  and  many  others  have  not  all 
been  purely  imaginary  like  Sir  Thomas  More's 
island  in  the  Atlantic,  but  some  have  been  tried 
out  in  actual  experience  and  under  the  mos 
favoring  circumstances. 

Robert  Owens  was  a  man  of  affairs.  He  built 
up  large  and  successful  cotton  factories  in  New 
Lanark.  He  spent  his  fortune  upon  industrial 
communities,  some  in  England  and  some  in  com- 
munist colonies  in  America. 

Robert  Dale  Owen,  son  of  Robert  Owen, 
was  so  able  a  man  that  he  was  sent  to  Congress 
several  terms  and  became  a  strong  political 
factor  in  Indiana. 


8  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

The  Viscount  Henri  de  Saint-Simon  was  a  man 
of  fortune  and  a  scientist  who  enjoyed  the  friend- 
ship and  co-operation  of  Auguste  Compte.  This 
French  nobleman  founded  more  than  one  com- 
munist society  in  France. 

Charles  Fourier  inherited  a  fortune  and  received 
a  good  business  training;  he  traveled  in  all  the 
commercial  nations  in  the  world  and  worked  out 
the  plans  upon  which,  soon  after  his  death,  sev- 
eral communist  villages  were  founded;  the  cele- 
brated Brook  Farm  was  one  of  these. 

From  plans  advocated  by  Socialists,  Louis 
Blanc,  an  officer  of  the  French  Republic,  estab- 
lished national  work-shops  in  Paris,  in  which 
over  a  hundred  thousand  men  were  employed. — 
This  whole  Utopian  movement,  imaginary  and 
experimental,  found  its  climax  in  Edward  Bell- 
amy's Looking  Backward,  a  book,  up  to  the  last 
half-dozen  years,  warmly  welcomed  and  defended 
by  Socialists.  Now,  is  the  Ideal  Republic  still  a 
potent  influence  in  Socialism?  Has  it  a  place  in 
the  socialist  programme  and  propaganda? 

Socialist  writers  themselves  return  the  answer. 
I  quote  from  acknowledged  authority : 

"It  cannot  be  doubted  that  Socialism  rep- 
resented by  Marx  and  the  Modern  Socialists' 
movement  is  radically  different  from  the 
earlier  Socialism  of  Fourier,  Saint-Simon, 
Cabet,  Owen,  and  a  host  of  other  builders  of 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK 

'cloud-palaces'  for  an  ideal  humanity.  *  *  * 
The  need  for  some  word  to  distinguish  be- 
tween the  two  is  obvious  and  the  only  ques- 
tion is  whether  the  words  'scientific*  and 
'Utopian'  express  with  reasonably  accuracy 
the  nature  of  the  difference."  *  *  * 
Then  Mr.  Spargo  adds:  "Is  it  not  to  see 
the  past,  present,  and  future  as  a  whole, 
a  growth,  a  constant  process,  so  that  in- 
stead of  vainly  fashioning  plans  for  a  millen- 
nial Utopia,  we  seek  in  the  facts  of  to- 
day the  stream  of  tendencies,  and  so  learn 
the  direction  of  the  immediate  course  of 
progress  ?"  * 

"As  a  matter  of  fact,  Morris  wrote  News 
from  Nowhere  as  a  retort  to  the  machine- 
like  Utopia  of  Edward  Bellamy.  Loving 
labor,  he  did  not  want  to  be  free  from  it, 
and  he  could  not  tolerate  the  thought  of  a 
civilization  founded  upon  bell-buttons  and 
automatic  machines,  f 

"Modern  Socialists  do  not  pretend  to  be 
architects  of  the  New  Order.  They  do  not 
propose  to  demolish  the  present  order  of 
things,  as  we  tear  down  an  old  building,  and 
then  compel  humanity  to  build  a  new  edifice 
according  to  any  plan  they  have  drawn. 
They  have  no  such  absurd  idea,  just  because 
they  know  that  Society  is  not  an  edifice  at 
all,  but  an  organism,  and  men  are  not  in  the 
habit  of  planning  the  development  of  a  dog 
or  of  a  rose-bush.  *  *  *  Utopists  were 

*  Socialism  by  John  Spargo,  1 909,  page  231  et  seq. 
t Socialists  at  Workby  Robert  Hunter,  1908,  page  288. 


IO  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

indeed  capital  critics  but  as  reformers  they 
were  miserable  failures.  They  ignored  all 
social  and  political  conditions.  They  wanted 
mankind  to  don  their  readv-made  system  as 
men  do  ready-made  clothes."  * 

In  addition  to  these  well-known  adherents  to 
and  authorities  upon  Modern  Socialism,  many 
others  might  be  quoted  affirming  what  is  said 
above  in  relation  to  the  ideal  Social  State.  In- 
deed, not  satisfied  with  baldly  and  emphatically 
repudiating  Utopia,  the  recognized  leaders  are 
careful  to  say  that  they  do  not  pretend  to  know 
the  form  which  their  movement  will  finally  as- 
sume, or  the  method  by  which  it  will  get  itself 
installed,  or  when,  or  where.  Even  Herr  Marx 
ir.  the  Communist  Manifesto  declares  Utopia 
as  "fantastic,"  without  "theoretic  justification," 
and  a  "duodecimo  edition  of  the  New  Jerusalem." 

But  why  have  Philosophic  Socialists  deserted 
Utopia? 

For  two  reasons :  First,  Utopia  in  reality,  that 
is  in  action,  failed;  second,  Utopia  in  ideality, 
that  is  in  imagination,  also  failed.  Both  failed 
to  respond  to  the  full  demands  of  human  nature. 
Men  love  struggle  and  conquest.  Literature 
without  a  villian  fails.  A  drama  without  a  vil- 
lain fails.  The  man  who  has  no  set-backs  to 

*77ie  Co-operative  Commonwealth  by  Laurence  Gronlund,  last  Lon- 
don edition,  page  101. 


II 


overcome,  who  finally  fails  to  circumvent  a  vil- 
lain, is  no  hero.  The  most  monotonous  thing  in 
all  the  world  is  a  uniformly  successful  man.  A 
Social  State  made  up  of  insipid  goody-goodies 
like  Dr.  Leete  attracts  nobody. 

Mr.  Bellamy's  Looking  Backward  laid  a 
premium  on  the  weak  and  the  stupid;  in  effect 
it  made  the  stupid  man  the  standard;  it  pro- 
posed a  commerce,  national  and  international, 
based  on  card-board  pay-checks;  it  failed  to 
recognize  that  envy,  hatred,  malice,  cupidity, 
militant  ambition,  jealousy,  pugnacity,  are  all  be- 
gotten of  justifiable,  yea,  necessary  faculties  and 
passions, — are  merely  the  over-emphasis  of  these 
same  faculties  and  passions.  Swine  are  satisfied 
with  feed  and  shelter ;  to  assume  that  bread,  but- 
ter, and  shelter  will  satisfy  a  man  is  to  reduce  him 
to  the  level  of  the  pig. 

In  his  essay  on  The  Formation  of  Human 
Character,  Robert  Owen  says: 

"Any  general  character,  from  the  best  to 
the  worst,  from  the  most  ignorant  to  the 
most  enlightened,  may  be  given  to  any  com- 
munity by  those  who  have  influence  in  the 
affairs  of  men." 

But  Owen  failed.  Icaria  failed.  M.  Saint- 
Simon  and  his  coalescence  of  prince  and  pontiff 
failed.  M.  Fourier  and  his  palaces  in  which  were 
to  dwell  two  thousand  people  cohering  by  the 


12  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

polar  attraction  of  their  affinities  failed.  The 
Brook  Farm  failed.  John  Alexander  Dowie  and 
his  Second  Apostles  at  Zion  City  failed.  The 
Utopia  of  Edward  Bellamy  failed,  while  the 
Shakers  and  Mennonites,  richest  communities  of 
them  all,  are  announced  to  be  on  the  point  of  dis- 
solution,— the  great  stirring  world  has  attracted 
the  young  people  and  the  old  have  ceased  to  pro- 
test. These  failures  left  to  rational  Socialists 
just  one  thing  to  do, — to  repudiate  the  Utopists. 

This  repudiation  has  gone  so  far  as  to  mani- 
fest itself  over  and  over  again  in  socialist  litera- 
ture, even  in  the  title  of  books.  One  standard 
writer  has  a  work  which  he  calls  Socialism, 
Utopian  and  Scientific.  The  scientific  school  ral- 
lies around  the  standard  raised  by  Karl  Marx 
so  that  the  line  is  now  closely  drawn  between 
the  Owenites  and  the  Marxites.  Some  of  the  lat- 
ter go  so  far  as  to  express  a  lofty  contempt  for 
Utopia  and  all  its  works. 

Nevertheless  this  retreat  from  Utopia  to  phi- 
losophy must  have  been  very  humiliating  to  sen- 
timental Socialists: — This,  because  it  was  pre- 
cisely in  Utopia  that  the  conception  of  a  system- 
atic Socialism  first  arose.  To  desert  this  ground 
was  like  forsaking  its  very  mother.  Besides 
there  is  something  wonderfully  attractive  to  the 
benevolent  but  superficial  and  imaginative  mind 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  13 

in  a  human  society  where  there  is  no  such  thing 
as  injustice  or  wrong;  where  every  body  is  fed, 
clothed,  and  sheltered  in  equality. 

It  is  not  at  first  perceived  that  if  all  hills  were 
exactly  alike,  landscapes  would  lose  much  of  their 
beauty;  if  all  trees  were  exactly  alike,  forests 
would  become  monotonous  and  dreary. 

It  is  not  at  first  perceived  that  the  ordinary 
man  is  prospered  by  the  extraordinary  man. 
Take  an  instance:  Governor  Francis  and  his  co- 
workers  by  organizing  a  World's  Fair  and  set- 
tling the  best  products  of  all  nations,  tongues, 
and  kindreds  upon  one  square  section  of  land, 
for  the  edification  and  enjoyment  of  all  the  peo- 
ple did  this  by  the  exercise  of  extraordinary 
ability  and  its  good  results  were  distributed 
through  all  classes  down  to  and  including  a 
shoveler  on  the  dump  as  well  as  a  char-woman 
whose  only  tool  is  a  scrubbing-brush. 

It  is  a  mistake  to  say  that  the  Captain  of  In- 
dustry, the  extraordinary  man,  succeeds  at  the 
expense  of  the  ordinary  man, — frequently  in- 
stead of  taking  an  instrument  of  labor  from  the 
hand  of  the  ordinary  worker  the  Captain  of  In- 
dustry puts  an  instrument  of  labor  into  the  hands 
of  the  worker. 

It  is  not  at  first  perceived  that  to  reduce  the 
opportunity  of  such  men  as  Governor  Francis 


14  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

to  that  of  the  shovelers,  Giuseppe  and  Giovanna, 
would  be  a  public  loss, — as  ability  widens,  oppor- 
tunity widens.  Foresight  takes  care  of  that.  To 
pull  the  Governor  down  is  to  push  still  further 
down  such  as  Giuseppe  and  Giovanna.— All  this 
is  at  first  un-perceived.  It  is  variety  and  unex- 
pected change  which  give  pleasure  and  zest  to 
human  life.  No  one  knows  this  better  than  the 
editor  of  a  yellow  newspaper, — if  sensations  do 
not  come  out  of  the  world  of  reality  and  exag- 
geration, he  produces  them  out  of  the  world  of 
the  imagination. 

Indeed  the  very  quality  of  the  human  mind 
which  created  such  an  interest  in  Looking  Back- 
ward was  ignored  in  the  economy  and  structure 
of  the  society  pictured  in  the  book  itself.  All 
these  great  Utopian  pictures,  sometimes  inspired 
by  sensualism;  sometimes  by  pantheism;  some- 
times by  materialism ;  sometimes  by  artistic  senti- 
ment; sometimes  by  sympathy  for  learning  and 
science ;  sometimes  by  pity  for  the  poor,  neglect- 
ed, and  suffering,  have  the  lure  and  drawing 
power  which  ever  surround  mystery  and  the 
secrets  of  the  future.  To  desert  this  great  and 
productive  field,  in  which  the  imagination  could 
embody  itself  without  limit,  in  poetic  power  and 
fancy,  must  have  been  a  matter  of  chagrin  and 
disappointment  to  all  reflective  Socialists.  But 
human  nature  is  too  great  a  thing,  too  complex, 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  15 

and  too  subtle,  to  be  standardized  by  artifice  or 
to  be  comprehended  in  rules  and  measures. 
Does  Socialism  understand  itself? 

THE  MARXIAN  CONTRADICTION 

In  falling  back  from  Utopia,  it  was  necessary 
for  systematic  Socialism  to  rally  somewhere. 
There  was  need  of  authority,  of  the  glorifica- 
tion of  great  names,  of  the  mystery  of  great  doc- 
trines, of  appeal  to  mighty  passions,  of  cogency, 
of  coherence. 

All  these  were  found  in  the  espousal  of  the 
Darwinian  theory  and  the  evolution  of  Herbert 
Spencer,  supplemented  by  the  historic  specula- 
tions of  Auguste  Compte.  Scientific  justifica- 
tion was  needed.  From  being  a  devotee  of  the 
Imagination,  Socialism  suddenly  emerged  into  a 
devotee  of  Science, — Karl  Marx  and  Karl 
Rodbertus  became  its  prophets  and  interpreters. 

With  enthusiasm,  it  turned  to  that  school  of 
thought  in  which  facts  of  the  mind  are  regarded 
as  related  to,  but  also  subservient  to,  facts  of  mat- 
ter. Man  was  evolved  from  matter  and  directly 
fell  into  two  classes,  the  oppressors  and  the  op- 
pressed, the  expropriators  and  the  expropriated, 
the  bourgeoisie  and  the  proletariate.  The  stages 
of  evolution  are  marked  successively  by  the 
patriarch  and  the  servant,  the  chief  and  the  slave, 


l6  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

the  feudal  baron  and  the  serf,  the  patrician  and 
the  plebian,  the  wage-worker  and  the  wage- 
payor.  Society  has  progressed  from  the  paternal 
rule  of  the  patriarch  to  the  tyranny  of  the  capital- 
ist. All  social  movements,  political,  commercial, 
industrial,  religious,  revolutionary,  reformatory, 
reactionary,  educational,  scientific,  philosophic; 
all  manners  and  customs;  all  faiths  and  beliefs 
are  to  be  referred  to  actions  and  reactions  of  these 
two  classes, — industrial  oppressors  and  industri- 
ally oppressed.  This  is  called  the  Economic  In- 
terpretation of  History,  which,  (though  not  al- 
ways admitted)  is  another  way  of  stating  the 
Materialistic  Conception  of  History  propounded 
by  Auguste  Compte  and  adopted  by  Karl  Marx. 

According  to  this  economic  view,  as  the  work- 
ing-man evolved  from  a  state  of  chattel-slavery 
to  that  of  wage-slavery,  so  he  will  go  on  advanc- 
ing by  a  process  of  evolution  until  his  class  greatly 
outnumbers  the  capitalistic  class,  then,  by  politi- 
cal force,  he  will  come  into  his  proportional  share 
of  all  the  goods  produced  in  the  Social  State, — 
this  will  be  inevitable  because  the  process  of 
evolution  is  inevitable. 

An  important  corollary  to  all  this  is  that  the 
community  of  goods  will  vest  in  the  working- 
man  because  this  class  produces  the  commodities, 
hence  all  values.  A  second  corollary  is  that  com- 
petition will  disappear, — Socialism  is  the  Nemesis 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  17 

of  competion.  The  capitalistic  class  will  either 
be  merged  into  the  working-class  or  its  members 
become  extinct,  so  there  will  be  one  class  only. 

That  such  is  a  fair  statement  of  the  New 
Socialism  I  think  will  not  be  disputed  by  Social- 
ists themselves.  It  may  be  disputed  by  others, 
hence  I  quote  a  few  authorities : 

"We  never  get  away  from  the  law  of 
economic  interpretation.  Socialism,  accord- 
ing to  Marx,  will  develop  out  of  capitalistic 
society,  and  follow  capitalism  necessarily  and 
inevitably.  It  is  a  plan,  not  to  be  adopted, 
but  a  stage  of  social  development  to  be 
reached."  * 

"Since  the  work  of  Lyell,  Darwin,  Wal- 
lace, Spencer,  Huxley,  Youmans,  the  idea 
of  evolution  as  a  universal  law  has  made 
rapid  and  certain  progress.  Everything: 
changes.  Only  the  law  of  change  is  chang- 
less.  The  present  is  a  phase  only  of  a 
great  transition  process  from  what  was, 
through  what  is,  to  what  will  be.  The 
Marx-Engels  theory  is  an  exploration  of  this 
process  of  evolution  in  human  relations."  f 

"Thus  the  existing,  local  system  appears 
to  the  Socialist  of  today,  not  as  it  appeared 
to  the  Utopians  but  as  the  result  of  an  age- 
long evolutionary  process,  determined,  not 
wholly  indeed,  but  mainly  by  certain 

* Socialism  by  John  Spargo.  1 909,  page  lit. 
t  Idem,  page  77. 


1 POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

methods  of  producing1  the  necessaries  of  life, 
and  secondly,  of  effecting  their  exchange."* 

"Two  Germans,  Karl  Marx  and  Frederick 
Engels,  two  of  the  clearest  and  most  cogent 
thinkers  the  last  century  produced,  took  up 
this  labor  where  Compte  laid  it  down, — or 
rather  where  Compte  broke  down.  These 
two  men  by  their  joint  labors  carried 
Sociology  out  of  its  theoretical  infancy  and 
its  metaphysical  childhood  into  the  full  man- 
hood of  science.  These  men  grave  us  the 
great  social  law  which  makes  all  theological 
notions  and  metaphysical  speculations  hence- 
forth as  obsolete  in  sociology  as  they  have 
long  been  in  astronomy  and  physics.  This 
law  is  called  the  Material  Conception  of 
History.  It  is  to  sociology  what  Natural 
Selection  is  to  biology  or  the  law  of  gravi- 
tation to  astronomy.  By  this  discoverv  Marx 
becomes  the  Newton  of  political  economy 
and  historical  philosophy,  and  the  Darwin  of 
sociology."  f 

"The  history  of  society  in  the  past  is  the 
history  of  past  struggles.  Freemen  and 
slaves,  patricians  and  plebians,  nobles  and 
serfs,  guild-members  and  journeymen, — in 
short  oppressors  and  oppressed,  have  always 
stood  in  direct  opposition  to  each  other."  * 

The  question  now  arises  is  Socialism  any  more 
secure  oft  what  it  calls  scientific  ground  than  it 

*  Socialism  by  John  pargo.  1909,  page  75. 

t  Lecture  on  Auguste  Compte  by  Arthur  M.  Lewis,  19Q8. 

tThe  Communist  Manifesto  paragraph  1. 


19 

was  upon  Utopian  ground?  Organic  evolution 
according  to  Darwin  is  by  Natural  Selection  and 
what  somebody  else  calls  a  Survival  of  the  Fit- 
test. Darwin's  doctrine  establishes  the  validity 
of  struggle  and  conquest, — this  is  the  Strong- 
man Theory  in  history, — Competion,  the  very 
thing  which  all  schools  of  Socialism  set  them- 
selves up  to  overthrow  and  destroy. 

Mr.  Darwin  calls  one  of  the  most  remarkable 
chapters  in  the  Origin  of  Species  the  Struggle  for 
Existence.  I  extract  a  few  pertinent  sentences: 
(i)  "Nothing  is  easier  than  to  admit  in  words 
the  truth  of  the  universal  struggle  for  life;"  (2) 
"Battle  within  battle  must  ever  be  recurring  with 
varying  success;  and  yet  in  the  long  run  the 
forces  are  so  nicely  balanced,  that  the  face  of 
nature  remains  uniform  for  long  periods  of  time, 
though  assuredly  the  merest  trifle  would  often 
give  the  victory  to  one  organic  being  or  the 
other;"  (3)  "But  the  struggle  almost  invariably 
will  be  the  most  severe  between  individuals  of 
the  same  species;"  (4)  "Even  slow-breeding  man 
has  doubled  in  twenty-five  years,  and  at  this  rate, 
in  a  few  thousand  years,  there  literally  would  not 
be  standing  room  for  his  progeny;"  (5)  "When 
we  reflect  on  this  struggle,  we  may  console  our- 
sejves  with  the  full  belief,  that  the  war  of  nature 
is  not  incessant,  that  no  fear  is  felt,  that  death 
is  generally  prompt,  and  that  the  vigorous,  the 


2O  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

healthy,  and  the  happy  survive  and  multiply;" 
(6)  "Lyell  has  largely  and  philosophically  shown 
that  all  organic  beings  are  exposed  to  severe 
competition." 

The  fact  seems  to  be  that  if  moral  force  be 
eliminated  from  evolution  that  the  ambition  of 
man,  even  now,  would  be  "to  eat  and  not  to  be 
eaten,  to  kill  and  not  to  be  killed,  to  enslave  and 
not  to  be  enslaved."  It  seems  to  me  that  this 
effort  to  place  Modern  Socialism  on  scientific 
ground  involves  itself  in  a  contradiction  which 
for  a  better  term  I  shall  call  the  Marxian  Contra- 
diction. In  face  of  this  contradiction  what  are 
Socialists  to  do? 

This  brings  us  up  squarely  to  the  question: 
What  is  it  Modern  Socialists  want?  Let  Sidney 
Webb,  one  of  the.  brightest  Fabian  essayists, 
answer : 

"The  truly  socialistic  scheme  is  to  make  an 
equal  provision  for  the  maintenance  of  all  an 
incident  and  indefeasible  condition  of  citi- 
zenship, without  any  regard  whatever  to  the 
relative  specific  services  of  different  citizens 
and  instead  of  leaving  the  rendering  of  the 
requisite  service  to  the  option  of  the  citizen, 
to  require  each  citizen  to  perform  the  part 
allotted  to  him,  under  one  uniform,  civic 
law." 

In  commenting  on  Mr.  Webb's  definition  of 
the  purpose  of  Socialism,  W.  H.  Mallock 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  21 

observes:  "That  as  the  man  is  talented  he  is  to 
get  less  than  he  produces  and  in  proportion  as 
he  is  stupid  he  is  to  get  more  than  he  produces."* 
But  to  go  back  to  the  Marxian  Contradiction : 
If,  as  Mr.  Spargo  says,  "Socialism  will  follow 
Capitalism  necessarily  and  inevitably,  not  as  a 
plan  adopted  but  as  a  development  reached," 
through  a  Universal  Energy  operating  in  Evolu- 
tion,— why  this  propaganda?  Why  this  bitter 
assault  upon  Capitalism  admitted  to  be  a  neces- 
sary step  in  Evolution,  hence  validated  on  the 
same  grounds  upon  which  it  is  sought  to  validate 
the  coming  order  of  Socialism?  If  the  Fittest 
is  to  survive  and  Socialism  is  the  Fittest,  then 
it  will  be  evolved  into  power  despite  all  other 
influences.  While  the  propaganda  may  not  work 
a  denial,  does  it  not  tend  to  create  a  doubt  as 
to  whether  Socialism  believes  in  its  own  prem- 
ises? understands  itself? 

One  other  thing  remains  to  be  noticed  in  con- 
nection with  this  effort  of  Philosophic  Socialism 
to  bring  itself  under  the  wing  of  Darwinism: 
The  great  leaders  of  Synthetic  Evolution  have 
been  avowed  enemies  of  this  so-called  New 
Order.  Herbert  Spencer's  essay  on  the  Coming 
Slavery  is  the  most  effective  blow  ever  delivered 
against  the.  doctrine  laid  down  by  Mr.  Webb. 

•Johns  Hopkins  lecture  of  W.  H.  Mallock,  1908. 


22  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

John  Stuart  Mill's  Essay  on  Liberty  and  his  other 
writings  are  powerful  attacks  on  the  groundwork 
of  the  system.  Professor  Huxley  says  in  a  criti- 
cism on  the  Religion  of  Humanity  that  "it  is 
Catholicism  minus  Christianity."  It  is  evident, 
then,  that  when  the  Marxites  fell  back  from  the 
Owenites  they  not  only  reached  the  dilemma  of 
a  constructional  denial  and  a  contradiction  but 
they  took  refuge  in  the  house  of  their  enemies. 
This  dilemma  necessitated  a  second  retreat. 
Under  the  Darwinian  theory,  the  Fittest  only 
shall  survive:  Under  the  Webb  theory,  the  Un- 
fittest  also  shall  survive.  Notwithstanding  Mr. 
Darwin's  prediction  that  the  race  would  reach  by- 
and-bye  a  point  where  it  would  not  have  stand- 
ing-room, Prince  Kropotkin,  said  to  be  an  An- 
archist and  a  Russian  scholar  of  distinction, 
comes  forward  with  a  reconciliation: — This  by 
way  of  a  new  definition  of  the  Fittest.  The  Fit- 
test are  those  who  can  co-operate  and  then  defend 
themselves  against  the  prowess  of  what  Lord 
Tennyson  denominates  the  "red  tooth  and  claw." 
The  Prince  says  that  sparrows,  pelicans,  bees, 
ants,  crows,  quails,  wild-pigeons,  and  some  kinds 
of  fish  preserve  themselves  by  this  co-operation 
which  he  calls  the  instinct  of  "Mutual  Aid." 
Here  is  found  in  nature  the  justification  of  co- 
operative Socialism,  leaving  Darwin's  question 
of  over-population  still  to  be  met  and  here  So- 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  23 

cialism  finds  a  cover  for  its  second  retreat, — the 
defense  of  a  partridge  against  a  wild-cat. 

REPUDIATING  VIOLENCE 

Times  without  number,  Socialism  has  defined 
itself  in  platforms  and  programmes  to  mean: 
"The  social  ownership  and  control  of  all  the 
means  of  production,  distribution  and  exchange." 
In  the  first  section  of  the  Communist  Manifesto, 
Herr  Marx  says : 

"We  have  followed  the  more  or  less  con- 
cealed civil  war  pervading  in  modern  society 
up  to  that  point,  where  it  must  break  forth 
in  open  revolution,  and  then  the  Proletariate 
will  arrive  at  supremacy  through  the  forci- 
ble downfall  of  the  Bourgeoisie." 

The  Communist  Manifesto,  according  to  Mr. 
Spargo,  is  regarded  as  the  birth-cry  of  Modern 
Socialism.  It  was  written  by  Marx  and  Engels 
arid  adopted  by  the  Communist  League  at  the 
London  meeting  in  1847.  It  is  the  fundamental 
canon  and  doctrine  of  the  present-day  movement, 
so  regarded  by  all  "who  speak  with  any  authority 
whatever"  in  the  councils  of  socialist  propa- 
ganda. 

But  what  has  become  of  the  imperative  edict 
for  Proletarians  to  attain  supremacy  by  forcible 
downfall  of  Capitalism? 


24  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

G.  Derwent  Smith,  an  English  writer  on  the 
New  Socialism  and  a  student  who  has  worked 
out  a  very  ingenious  indictment  against  what  he 
calls  "artificial  monopoly,"  says: 

"There  is  no  danger  in  hords  of  accumu- 
lated wealth  in  the  hands  of  individuals  so 
long  as  a  decent  and  comfortable  subsistence 
is  within  the  reach  of  everybody,  *  *  * 
The  advance  to  Socialism  may  very  likely  be 
by  way  of  palliatives,  but  it  will  only  be 
reached  when  its  main  idea,  the  public  own- 
ership of  the  means  of  production  and  dis- 
tribution, safe-guarded  by  complete  democ- 
racy, has  been  fully  realized."  * 

In  the  socialist  book  entitled  Merrie  England, 
Robert  Blatchford  says: 

"Socialism  will  not  come  by  means  of 
sudden  coup.  It  will  grow  up  naturally 
out  of  our  surroundings  and  will  develop 
gradually  and  by  degrees."  f 

The  same  spirit  runs  through  the  scholastic 
and  socialistic  writings  of  H.  G.  Wells  and  the 
Fabian  school  of  Socialism.  American  propa- 
gandists are  even  more  pronounced  than  the 
English  that  the  New  Order  will  be  inaugurated 
in  a  pacific  manner.  For  instance  Mr.  Hunter 
says  in  a  chapter  entitled  Socialism  in  the  Parlia- 
ments: 

*N*tural  Monopolies  by  C.  Derwent  Smith,  London,  1 909,  pages  133 
tAferr/e  EnglAndby  Robert  Blatchford,  American  edition,  page  86- 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  25 

"Socialists  have  no  desire  to  pursue  the 
desperate  methods  of  inciting  workers  to  in- 
surrection. They  realize  that  violence  is  a 
sign  of  weakness.  Increasing  influence, 
and  a  growing  assurance  that  Socialism  will 
eventually  attain  complete  powei,  have  en- 
couraged them  to  work  with  confidence  to- 
ward the  end  of  converting  a  majority  of 
the  nation  to  their  views."  * 

Mr.  Spargo  says  in  a  chapter  on  the  Means  of 
Realisation: 

"True  there  is  still  a  good  deal  of  »alk 
about  the  Social  Revolution,  and  there  may 
be  a  few  Socialists,  here  and  there,  who  be- 
lieve that  Capitalism  will  come  to  a  great 
crisis ;  that  there  will  be  a  rising  of  millions 
in  wrath,  a  night  of  fury,  and  agony,  and 
then  the  sunrise  of  Brotherhood  above  the 
bloodstained  valley  and  the  corps-strewn 
plain.  But  most  of  us  think  only  of  the 
change  that  must  come  over  society,  transfer- 
ing  the  control  of  its  life  from  the  few  to  the 
many.  *  *  *  No  considerable  body  of 
Socialists  anywhere  in  the  world  to-day,  and 
no  Socialist  whose  words  have  any  influence 
in  the  movement,  believes  that  there  will  be 
a  sudden,  violent  change  from  Capitalism  to 
Socialism."  f 

President  Woolsey  says  that  the  life  of  the  In- 
ternational Workingmen's  Association  went  out 

*Socia/;sfs  At  Work. 
tSocialism. 


26 


POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 


in  the  violence  of  the  Paris  Commune  of  1871. 
The  failure  of  this  Commune  and  the  ensuing 
death  of  the  International  may  have  had  some- 
thing to  do  with  modifying  the  programme  of 
organized  and  official  Socialism. 

This  changed  attitude  from  a  programme  of 
aggressive  violence  to  one  of  democratic,  parlia- 
mentary method  is  made  all  the  more  significant 
by  the  fact  that  European  Socialists  are  divided 
into  two  branches  and  neither  branch  advocates 
the  "open  revolution,"  the  "forcible  downfall"  of 
all  existing  social  conditions  as  announced  by 
Herr  Marx.  Both  branches  claim  to  be  constitu- 
tional and  parliamentary :  One,  the  Marxite,  pro- 
posing to  promote  its  programme,  as  a  whole; 
the  other,  the  Revisionists  or  Opportunists,  are 
piecemeal  reformers:  One  proposes  to  overturn, 
the  other  to  uplift,  but  up-lifters  and  over-turners 
alike  agree  in  the  end  aimed  at.  Both  branches 
are  political,  the  first  maintaining  a  party  of  its 
own  and  insisting  on  the  dogma  of  Class-con- 
sciousness ;  the  other  seeks  to  accomplish  its  ends 
through  existing  political  parties.  Characteristic 
leaders  of  the  first  are  Kautsky  in  Germany, 
Guesde  in  France,  Ferri  in  Italy,  and  Hyndman 
in  England;  leaders  of  the  second  are  Bernstein, 
Miller,  and  Turati,  and  the  Fabianists. 

The  point  is  that  neither  party  advocates  the 
militant  violence  announced  to  come  in  the  Com- 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  27 


munist  Manifesto.  Political  Socialism  has  fallen 
back  from  the  vital  principle,  the  violent  pro- 
gramme, of  its  founder. 

CONCESSION  TO  ESTABLISHED  ORDER 

In  my  endeavor  to  answer  the  question:  Is 
Political  Socialism  gaining  or  losing  ground?  is 
it  still  aggressive  or  gradually  falling  into  a  de- 
fensive position?  I  adduce  one  more  particular 
and  then  content  myself  with  a  few  minor  but 
relevant  observations. 

The  question  now  comes  on  the  attitude  of 
Socialism  toward  the  individual, — that  is  the 
opportunity  which  the  proposed  New  Order 
offers  for  self-realization,  personal  liberty,  and 
private  property. 

In  the  communes  of  that  "gentle,  mystic 
dreamer,"  M.  Saint-Simon,  the  entire  popula- 
tion, all  humanity,  was  to  be  organized  into  one 
family  and  the  whole  earth  was  to  be  made  into 
one  farm,  the  fruits  apportioned  in  the  family 
according  to  merit,  the  relative  merits  to  be  as- 
certained by  scientific  standards, — "From  every 
man  according  to  his  ability,  to  every  man  ac- 
cording to  his  needs."  Members  of  this  uni- 
versal family  were  to  be  divided  into  three 
classes;  workers,  artists,  savants.  Science  was 
to  be  apotheosized.  The  functions  of  pope  and 


25  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

emperor,  spiritual  and  temporal  power,  were  to 
coalesce.  The  sexes  were  to  be  equal.  One  man 
only  was  to  marry  one  woman  only.  Religion, 
filial  relations,  property,  were  all  to  be  recog- 
nized but  there  was  to  be  no  right  of  bequest  or 
inheritance.  M.  Saint-Simon  had  been  in  this 
country  serving  as  a  soldier  with  Lafayette  and 
was  present  at  the  final  surrender  of  Yorktown. 
This  incident  in  his  life  made  him  popular  in  the 
United  States  but  so  far  as  I  can  learn  no  effort 
was  made  to  try  out  his  social  theories  in 
America. 

In  the  system  proposed  by  M.  Fourier,  a  group 
of  five  or  six  persons  was  to  correspond  to  the 
cell  in  a  living  organism.  Three  or  four  of  these 
groups  were  to  form  a  phalanx ;  three  or  four  of 
these  phalanxes  were  to  form  a  union;  three  or 
four  of  these  unions  were  to  form  a  district ;  and 
so  on  through  the  provinces,  nations,  empires, 
caliphates,  regions,  and  continents,  until  the 
whole  world  became  a  unity.  Two  thousand  peo- 
ple in  regimentation  were  to  live  in  palaces  called 
phalansteries.  Free  love  was  to  prevail.  The 
family  was  to  be  abolished.  This  great  industrial 
army  was  to  be  commanded  by  line  officers, — un- 
archs,  diarchs,  triarchs,  and  finally  an  omniarch 
whose  empire  was  the  world.  Labor  was  to  be 
regarded  as  a  pleasure;  the  products  to  go  five 
parts  to  the  workingman,  four  parts  to  capital, 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  29 

three  parts  to  talent.  Under  the  system  great  im- 
provements in  production  were  to  be  made, — so 
great  that  Great  Britain  was  to  pay  her  national 
debt  in  six  months  by  the  sale  of  hens'  eggs.  Sea- 
water  was  to  be  made  palatable  as  lemonade  and 
the  North  Pole  was  to  be  habitable.  Man's  men- 
tal and  moral  well-being  was  to  be  improved  as 
well  as  his  physical.  New  faculties  were  to  de- 
velop. New  senses  were  to  make  an  appearance 
and  an  eye  was  to  grow  in  the  back  of  the  head. 
Fourierism  was  tried  and  failed. 

In  Mr.  Bellamy's  Looking  Backward,  the 
working  forces  of  the  State  were  organized  into 
an  industrial  army.  In  this  army  were  four 
classes  of  workers,  all  paid  the  same  wages, — 
not  money  but  time-checks.  The  worker  whom 
Mr.  Mallock  describes  as  the  man  of  "exceptional 
ability"  received  no  more  than  the  least  pro- 
ductive worker  in  the  army, — that  is  to  say 
Governor  Francis  as  executive  officer  of  a 
World's  Fair  and  Giuseppe  who  dug  ditches  on 
the  World's  Fair  grounds  were  to  receive  time- 
checks  for  exactly  the  same  amounts  propor- 
tioned to  the  time  put  in.  In  this  army  were 
captains  of  tens  and  captains  of  hundreds  and 
captains  of  thousands, — that  is  to  say  there  were 
lieutenants,  captains,  colonels  and  even  generals. 
One  man  said  to  another  go  and  he  goeth,  to 
another  come  and  he  cometh. 


30  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

In  a  socialist  book  which  makes  itself  espe- 
cially serviceable  by  setting  out  official  pro- 
grammes, documents,  writings,  and  speeches  I 
find  that  Herr  Marx  himself  contended  for  com- 
pulsory labor  and  an  industrial  army.*  Curiously 
enough  late  editions  of  the  Communist  Manifesto 
have  elided  this  article.  It  appeared  in  the  second 
section  of  the  document  and  was  embodied  in 
the  earlier  writings  of  the  Marx  propaganda. 

The  question  recurs :  What  is  the  present  atti- 
tude of  Political  Socialism  toward  personal 
liberty  and  private  property?  Does  it  still  ad- 
here to  the  doctrine  of  "social  ownership  and 
control  of  all  the  means  of  production,  distribu- 
tion, and  exchange?"  In  vain  you  search  the 
programmes  last  issued  by  German,  Austrian, 
English,  Italian,  American  socialist  parties  for 
the  doctrine. 

The  Belgian  programme  is  admirable  in  its 
arrangement  and  succinct  in  statement  but 
nothing  is  said  about  an  industrial  army. 

The  French  Socialists  have  issued  the  mildest 
programme  of  all  and  of  course  no  allusion  is 
made  to  this  plan.  Nothing  is  said  in  these  vari- 
ous national  programmes  about  expropriating  or 
appropriating  private  property. 

In  an  article  printed  in  the  June,  1909,  North 
American  Review,  Mr.  Spargo  cleverly  and 

*  Modern  Socialism  by  R.  C.  K.  Ensor,  New  York.  1904.  page  36. 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  3\ 

vigorously  defends  his  party  against  the  charge 
that  it  seeks  to  socialize  all  private  property,  or 
circumscribe  personal  rights  or  circumvent  per- 
sonal liberty.  "Socialism,"  says  Spargo,  "has 
given  up  the  old  notion  of  the  regimentation  of 
labor  under  the  direction  of  the  State." 

In  the  1900  platform  of  the  National  Socialist 
Labor  party  is  a  declaration  favoring  the  aboli- 
tion of  private  property  without  qualification. 
The  1904  National  Socialist  platform  declared: 
"The  Socialist  is  the  only  party  which  stands  for 
principles  by  which  the  liberty  of  the  individual 
may  become  indeed  a  fact."  *  *  *  "Socialism 
comes  so  to  organize  industry  and  society  that 
every  individual  shall  be  secure  in  that  private 
property  is  the  means  of  life  upon  which  his 
liberty  of  being,  thought  and  action  depend." 
Except  as  to  trust  properties  the  1908  platform 
is  silent  on  the  question  of  private  property  and 
personal  liberty. 

To  conclude,  then,  does  not  this  brief,  citing 
the  very  best  socialist  authorities,  clearly  estab- 
lish the  fact  that  in  at  least  four  fundamental 
particulars  Political  Socialism  has  receded?  Of 
course  it  may  be  said  that  these  changes  are  ad- 
vances and  not  retreats,  progress  and  not  re- 
gress. But  the  changes  have  been  every  time 
away  from  the  ancient  land-marks  and  toward 
established  order.  These  recessions  amount  to 


32  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

concessions.  The  question  now  comes:  What 
is  left  of  Political  and  Philosophic  Social- 
ism ?  Is  there  a  saving  or  a  losing  remnant  ? 
The  answer  will  be  found  in  the  spirit  of  the 
words  quoted  by  Mr.  Wenley:  "Social  life  is  to 
personality  what  language  is  to  thought." 

What  is  called  Immediate  Demands  is  a  re- 
statement, for  the  most  part,  of  the  old  populite 
platform.  Populism  failed.  Socialism  will  fail. 
Both  strike  root  in  the  same  soil. 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  33 


CHAPTER  II. 

POLITICAL  SOCIALISM,— WHAT  IS  LEFT. 
A  LOSING  OR  A  SAVING  REMNANT? 

A  RESUME. — CARL  SCHURZ  ON  KARL  MARX. — SOCIALISTIC 
CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE.— THE  CLASS-WAR.— SURPLUS- 
VALUE. — SOCIALIST  CONCEPTION  OF  SURPLUS-VALUE  COR- 
RECT, APPLICATION  WRONG. — DOGMA  ILLUSTRATED  BY 
INDIANS  MAKING  SUN-DRIED  BRICK.— MARX  STOOD  FOR 
GOLD  MONEY. — ECONOMY  OF  TRUSTS,  EXTRAVAGANCE  OF 
GOVERNMENT. — MAYOR  SEIDEL  QUOTED. — ALDRICH  AND 
SHAW  QUOTED.— TYRANNY  OF  LAW.— TYRANNY  OF  THE 
STATE. — SHOPS  DISMAL. — STORES  TURNED  INTO  WARE- 
HOUSES.— NO  FASHIONS. — NO  ADVERTISING. — THE  SAV- 
ING REMNANT. 

There  have  been  two  distinct  schools  of 
systematic  Socialism;  one  speculative  the  other 
political,  one  persuasive  the  other  compulsory, 
one  passive  the  other  dynamic,  one  Owenite  the 
other  Marxite;  both  schools  have  sought  the 
same  ends  by  exactly  opposite  methods.  The 
Owenites  developed  into  Utopia,  tried  out  their 
methods  in  practice,  and  culminated  their  propa- 
ganda in  Mr.  Bellamy's  Looking  Backward,  a 
book  which  is  now  condemned  more  bitterly  by 
Socialists  than  by  anybody  else.  Both  practice 
and  propaganda  failed.  So  that  the  Owenites 
may  be  dismissed  from  other  than  incidental  con- 
sideration. 


34  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

CARL  SCHURZ  AND  KARL  MARX 

Political  Socialism  is  an  off-shoot  developed 
out  of  Utopian  Socialism  and  for  fifty  years  was 
concurrent  with  it;  indeed  the  recruits  of  the 
former  were  mostly  Utopians.  The  plan  has  not 
been  tried  out  in  concrete  form  since  1848,  (the 
year  in  which  the  Communistic  Manifesto  was 
issued).  In  that  year,  Louis  Blanc,  an  officer 
of  the  French  government,  under  stress  of  So- 
cialism, managed  to  induce  the  Republic  to  es- 
tablish public  workshops  in  Paris,  in  which  the 
workmen  elected  their  own  foremen  and  all  re- 
ceived the  same  wages.  In  these  ateliers  na- 
tionaux  more  than  a  hundred  thousand  men  were 
employed  and  more  than  fifty  thousand  dollars 
were  paid  out  daily  in  wages.  In  a  short  time 
there  was  an  outbreak  and  a  strike  in  which  the 
workmen  engaged.  After  much  loss  the  experi- 
ment was  declared  to  be  a  failure  and  abandoned. 
M.  Blanc  fled  to  England  where  he  wrote  an 
exhaustive  history  of  the  French  Revolution. 
Robert  Hunter,  a  well-known  Socialist  and 
American  writer,  says  that  Herr  Marx  was  much 
indebted  to  M.  Blanc  and  other  French  Socialists, 
for  his  philosophical  and  political  conception  of 
economic  society,  but  that  he  looked  with  lofty 
contempt  upon  Utopians  and  their  methods.  No 
doubt  that  Hunter  is  right  for  Marx  was  an  ar- 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  35 

bitrary  man.  Speaking  of  a  political  club  meet- 
ing at  Cologne,  a  very  distinguished  American 
publicist  says: 

"Among  others,  the  leader  of  the  Com- 
munists, Karl  Marx  was  there.  He  could  not 
have  been  much  more  than  thirty  years  old 
at  the  time,  but  already  was  the  recognized 
head  of  the  advanced  socialist  school.  The 
somewhat  thick-set  man,  with  his  broad 
forehead,  his  very  black  hair  and  beard  *nd 
his  dark  sparkling  eyes  at  once  attracted 
general  attention.  He  enjoyed  the  reputa- 
tion of  having  acquired  great  learning,  and 
as  I  knew  very  little  of  his  discoveries  and 
theories,  I  was  all  the  more  eager  to  gather 
words  of  wisdom  from  the  lips  of  that  fam- 
ous man.  This  expectation  w  s  disappointed 
in  a  peculiar  way.  Marx's  utterances  were 
full  of  meaning,  logical  and  clear,  but  I  have 
never  seen  a  man  whose  bearing  was  so  pro- 
voking and  intolerable.  To  no  opinion, 
which  differed  from  his,  he  accorded  the 
honor  of  even  a  condescending  consideration. 
Everyone  who  contradicted  him  he  treated 
with  abject  contempt;  every  argument  which 
he  did  not  like  he  answered  with  biting 
scorn  at  the  unfathomable  ignorance  that  had 
prompted  it,  or  with  opprobrious  aspersions 
upon  the  motive  of  him  who  had  advanced  it. 
*  *  *  Of  course  the  proposition  ad- 
vanced or  advocated  by  Marx  at  that  meeting 
was  voted  down."  * 

*C&rl  Schurz,  Reminiscences,  Vol.  I,  page  139. 


36  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

The  writer  then  goes  on  to  tell  how  he  took 
home  the  important  lesson,  that  he  who  would 
be  the  leader  and  teacher  of  men  must  treat  the 
opinions  of  others  with  respect.  It  might  be  in- 
teresting to  inquire  whether  the  time  did  not 
come  when  Mr.  Schurz  forgot  this  "important 
lesson." 

As  I  sat  in  the  gallery  at  the  National  Socialist 
convention  in  Brands's  Hall,  Chicago,  May  10, 
1908,  and  saw  the  demeanor  of  the  delegates  to- 
ward each  other,  and  heard  the  debates,  Schurz's 
words  forced  themselves  upon  me.  Identically 
the  same  spirit  and  disposition  manifest  in  Col- 
ogne, in  1848,  was  manifest  in  Chicago,  in  1908, 
no  less  in  the  female  than  in  the  male  delegates. 

But  coming  back  to  our  main  theme:  It  is 
singularly  worthy  of  notice  that  the  very  year, 
save  one,  in  which  State  Socialism  was  declared 
to  be  a  practical  failure  in  Paris,  it  was  declared 
to  be  a  theoretical  success  in  London.  In  its 
escape  from  Utopia,  political  Socialism  fell  back 
to  the  theory  of  evolution  where  for  a  time  it 
made  great  headway  under  the  assumed  sanction 
of  that  mighty  philosophy;  but  in  time,  it  here 
encountered  the  Marxian  Contradiction  involved 
in  the  Struggle  for  Existence,  the  Survival  of  the 
Fittest,  a  principle  directly  contrary  to  co-opera- 
tion; it  then  fell  back  to  the  "Mutual  Aid" 
theory  of  Prince  Kropotkin ;  next  it  encountered 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  37 

the  overwhelming  sentiment  against  a  com- 
pulsory, industrial  army  and  the  charge  that  it 
forestalled  personal  liberty  and  circumvented  the 
rights  of  personal  property;  it  has  now  fallen 
back  from  this  position  and  its  leaders  declare 
that  neither  personal  liberty  nor  private  property 
is  repugnant  to  its  spirit  and  policy, — indeed  the 
wisest  of  these  leaders  proclaim  themselves  to  be 
champions  of  both  personal  liberty  and  private 
property.  Notwithstanding  the  writings  of 
Herron,  Patterson,  Sinclair,  Garland,  and  Wells, 
Socialism  has  greatly  modified  its  attitude  to- 
wards the  institution  of  marriage,  the  family,  the 
sentiment  of  patriotism,  and  religious  worship. 

SOCIALIST  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  STATE 

Before  inquiring  into  what  is  left  of  Philo- 
sophic and  Political  Socialism,  it  may  be  well  to 
investigate  the  underlying  principle,  the  ultimate 
sanction,  upon  which  it  claims  to  rest  and  by 
which  it  seeks  to  justify  itself. 

After  the  manner  of  Auguste  Compte, — to 
whom,  as  before  remarked,  it  does  not  alway 
give  credit, — Philosophic  Socialism  conceives 
that  the  Man  is  made  for  the  State  and  not  the 
State  for  the  Man.  Humanity  in  the  abstract 
becomes  an  entity.  This  entity  is  idealized.  Not, 
perhaps,  in  concrete  form  as  the  spirit  of  the 


38  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

United  States  is  idealized  in  the  figure  of  Uncle 
Sam  or  as  British  character  is  represented  in 
pictures  of  John  Bull:  Nevertheless  an  entity. 
I  am  not  aware  that  Socialists  go  as  far  as  M. 
Compte  in  making  Humanity  an  object  of  wor- 
ship wherein  the  mother  represents  the  past,  the 
wife  the  present,  the  daughter  the  future.  But 
as  a  fundamental  proposition  of  Political  Social- 
ism, social  relations  are  everything.  An  acknowl- 
edged authority  has  worked  this  out  beautifully, 
in  these  words : 

"We  insist,  therefore,  that  the  State  is  a 
living  organism,  differing  from  other  organ- 
isms in  no  essential  respect." 

"Socialists  repudiate  the  theory  of  'natural 
rights'  and  insist  that  the  lesson  taught  by 
Rousseau  and  repeated  (why  not  say  it  out- 
right?) in  the  American  Declaration  of  In- 
dependence must  be  unlearned  before  any 
firm  foundation  can  be  reached." 

"It  is  Society,  organized  Society,  that  gives 
us  all  the  rights  we  have.  To  the  State  we 
owe  our  freedom.  To  it  we  owe  our  living 
and  property,  for,  outside  of  organized 
Society,  man's  needs  far  surpass  his  means. 
The  humble  beggar  owes  much  to  the  State, 
but  the  haughty  millionaire  far  more,  for, 
outside  of  it,  they  would  both  be  worse  off 
than  the  beggar  is  now.  To  it  we  owe  all 
that  we  are  and  all  that  we  have.  To  it  we 
owe  our  civilization.  The  State  is  the  organic 


39 


union  of  us  wherein  we  wage  war  against 
Nature  to  subdue  it,  to  redress  natural  de- 
fects and  inequalities.  The  State,  therefore, 
so  far  from  being  a  burden  to  the  'good/  a 
'necessary  evil/  is  man's  greatest  good." 

"The  State  may  to-morrow,  if  it  judges 
expedient,  take  all  the  capital  of  the  country 
from  its  present  owners,  without  any  com- 
pensation whatever  and  convert  it  into 
social  capital." 

"As  against  the  State  even  labor  does  not 
give  us  a  particle  of  title  to  what  our  hands 
and  brains  produce. — The  axe  you  use  is 
not  yours  though  your  hands  have  made  it, 
instead  of  buying  it  in  the  market.  The  idea 
of  the  axe,  its  potentiality,  which  enables  it 
to  prevail  over  nature,  does  not  belong  to 
you.  This  is  the  result  of  long  generations 
of  development,  from  the  rudest  stone-tool 
to  the  elegant  steel-blade  which  rings  through 
the  pine  woods  of  Maine.  This  belongs  to 
Society.  Neither  the  laborer  nor  the  capital- 
ist owns  the  principle.  So  everywhere. 
Neither  labor  nor  capital  employs  the  other. 
It  is  Society  which  employs  both.  To 
whom  does  the  telegraph  belong?  To 
Society.  Neither  Professor  Morse  nor  any 
other  inventor  can  lay  claim  to  it.  It  grew 
little  by  little." 

"Since  the  State  is  an  organism  it  is  more 
than  all  of  us  collectively.  It  rightly  in- 
cludes the  dead,  the  living,  and  the  coming 
generations." 


40  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

"Children  do  not  belong  to  their  parents ; 
they  belong  to  Society."  * 

A  writer,  Georgia  Kotsch,  in  the  June  1910 
International  Socialist  Review,  speaking  of 
mothers  says: 

"That  baby  which  you  call  yours  is  not 
wholly  yours.  She  has  individual  rights 
and  Society  has  a  claim  upon  her.  The 
kindergarten  is  fitted  as  you  are  not  to  care 
for  her.  You  surrender  her  to  one  after 
another  of  the  trained  educators  provided 
by  Society.  Other  mothers  surrender  the 
feeding  of  their  children  to  cooks  provided 
by  Society." 

Such  is  the  thesis  which  constructive,  aggres- 
sive, philosophic,  critical,  Political  Socialism 
postulates  and  defends.  Mr.  Gronlund  has  long 
been  regarded  as  one  of  its  foremost  exponents 
in  this  country.  A  casual  examination  will  at 
once  reveal  its  close  identity  with  the  doctrine 
of  Humanity  expounded  by  the  great  author  of 
the  Positive  Philosophy. 

Here,  then,  is  the  conception  of  the  State,  the 
sanction  of  the  New  Order.  The  individual  is 
an  incident;  the  State  everything.  It  is  a  bold 
doctrine  boldly  avowed.  But  we  have  seen  as  a 
matter  of  practice  and  as  a  policy  of  expediency, 
recession  after  recession  has  been  made  until  an 

*Go-opera</ve  Commonwealth  by  Laurence  Gronlund,  last  London 
edition,  page  8 1  et  seg.    Also  page  216. 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  41 


interesting  inquiry  is  raised:  What  practically 
is  left  of  Political  Socialism?  Later  on  I  shall 
raise  and  answer  the  question:  Without  the  in- 
dividual what  becomes  of  the  State?  Eliminate 
the  man  and  who  would  invent  the  telegraph? 
Who  would  forge  and  temper  the  beautiful  axe 
which  rings  out  so  musically  in  the  pine-woods  of 
Maine? 

CLASS  WAR  AND  SURPLUS  VALUE 

Accepting,  then,  in  good  faith,  the  waivers  of 
the  right  of  the  socialistic  State  to  form  a  com- 
pulsory, industrial  army;  to  abolish  private 
property;  to  circumvent  personal  liberty;  to 
forestall  self-realization;  to  insist  upon  an  ab- 
stract, idealized  entity  of  Society;  to  attack  the 
institution  of  the  family,  religious  worship,  and 
the  sentiment  of  patriotism, — accepting  all  these 
waivers,  we  find  two  fundamental  propositions 
left,  vis:  (i)  The  proposition  of  class-conscious- 
ness; (2)  The  proposition  of  surplus-value. 
These  two  propositions  are  the  residue, — are 
they  a  losing  or  a  saving  remnant? 

Suppose  that  it  should  turn  out  that  after  ex- 
pediency has  forced  these  waivers,  that  the 
waivers  have  neutralized  the  propositions  con- 
tended for:  Is  it  not  possible  that  if  Socialism 
be  a  rational  system,  that  the  recessions  and 


42  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

waivers  may  have  cut  the  very  ground  from 
under  it? 

I  think  we  shall  all  agree  that  Political  Social- 
ism seeks  to  institute  one  thing  and  eliminate 
another:  Through  dynamic  self-consciousness  it 
seeks  to  destroy  surplus-value, — perhaps  I  ought 
to  say  appropriate  surplus-value.  Its  expression 
is  to  take  some  form  of  democracy.  We  shall 
agree  that  its  philosophy  will  be  the  Economic 
Interpretation  of  History  which,  by  the  way,  is 
not  quite  so  repugnant  to  the  Christian  world  as 
the  Materialistic  Conception  of  History,  and  we 
shall  agree  that  class-consciousness  is  not  to  be 
an  end  unto  itself  but  a  means  to  reach  surplus- 
value.  Agreeing  thus  far  we  may  dispose  of  the 
dogma  of  self-consciousness  in  few  words. 

This  dogma  rests  upon  the  proposition  that  the 
worker  cannot  permanently  help  himself  as  an 
individual.  He  must  act  with  and  through  his 
class  and  as  his  class  is  enlightened  and  liberated, 
so  will  he  be  enlightened  and  liberated.  Getting 
a  perception  of  this  into  the  mind  of  the  worker 
is  properly  called  getting  class-consciousness, — 
the  motive,  it  is  said,  meets  the  approval  of  the 
worker's  conscience:  Thus  class-consciousness 
and  class-conscience  mutually  support  each  other. 
The  method  of  Political  Socialism  being  demo- 
cratic it  must  receive  the  sanction  of  a  majority 
through  agitation  and  education.  When  it  comes 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  43 

into  power  it  will  absorb  all  other  classes  and 
thus  class-distinction  will  disappear;  it  will  have 
served  its  purpose. 

Pertinent  to  the  class-struggle,  Herr  Marx  has 
written  little  but  that  little  is  to  the  point.  I 
quote : 

"In  the  former  case,  we  had  the  expropria- 
tion of  the  mass  of  the  people  by  a  few 
usurpers;  in  the  latter,  we  have  the  expro- 
priation of  the  few  by  the  mass  of  the 
people."  *  *  * 

"We  have  seen  that  the  continual  tendency 
and  the  law  of  development  of  capitalist 
production  is  to  separate  the  means  of  pro- 
duction more  and  more  from  labor,  and  to 
concentrate  the  scattered  means  of  produc- 
tion more  and  more  in  large  groups  thereby 
transforming  labor  into  wage-labor  and  the 
means  of  production  into  capital."  * 

"The  monopoly  of  capital  becomes  a  fetter 
upon  the  mode  of  production,  which  has 
sprung  up  and  flourished  along  with,  and 
under  it.  Centralization  of  the  means  of  pro- 
duction and  socialization  of  labor  at  last 
reach  a  point  where  they  become  incom- 
patible with  their  capitalistic  integument. 
This  integument  is  burst  assunder.  The 
knell  of  capitalistic,  private  property  sounds. 
The  expropriators  are  expropriated."  f 
This  dogma  of  self-consciousness  especially  as 
announced  in  the  Communist  Manifesto  has  been 

* Capital  by  Karl  Mane  Vol.  Ill,  page  1031. 
tCap/ta/by  Karl  Marx,  Vol.  I,  page  847. 


44  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

severely  criticised  by  the  Rgt.  Hon.  H.  O.  Arnold- 
Forster,  James  Edward  le  Rossignol,  and  others. 
But  as  it  is  admittedly  a  mere  matter  of  method, 
contingent  upon  the  main  proposition,  I  pass  it 
without  further  consideration  save  to  note  that 
Socialism,  having  chosen  the  weapons,  it  cannot 
be  heard  to  complain  if  class-war  be  invoked 
against  it.  Retaliation  in  kind  is  always  in 
order.  "Brayed  in  the  mortar  with  wheat  yet 
will  they  not  depart  from  their  own  foolishness," 
was  said  a  long  time  ago.  The  folly  in  this  case 
will  become  apparent  when  we  come  to  define  the 
classes,  estimate  their  relative  numbers,  and  con- 
sider their  component  parts. 

DOCTRINE  OF  SURPLUS-VALUE 
ILLUSTRATED 

Elimination  has  now  so  simplified  matters  that 
we  readily  see  that  the  whole  system  of  philo- 
sophic, Political  Socialism  turns  upon  one  ques- 
tion,— surplus-value.  And  that  is  exactly  what 
Herr  Marx  intended.  As  an  abstract  and  origi- 
nal question,  I  am  not  inclined  to  dispute  the 
validity  of  the  surplus-value  theory  any  more 
than  I  am  the  abstract  real-estate  theory  of  Henry 
George.  But  I  follow  Spencer  in  his  contention 
that  vested  rights  have  an  equity  which  ought 
not  and  which  cannot  be  ignored,  and  I  insist 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  45 

that  surplus-value  in  this  country  is  apportioned 
to  both  Labor  and  Capital. 

The  State  itself  was  founded  by  force.  Its 
roots  may  be  traced  to  illegitimacy.*  We 
have  seen  in  the  words  of  Mr.  Gronlund  how 
Socialists  recognize  its  vested  rights;  yea  apo- 
theosize them.  To  demand  vested  rights  for  the 
State  and  to  deny  them  to  the  individual  is  a  re- 
versal of  the  natural  order, — an  impossible  thesis. 

A  review  of  the  theory  of  surplus-value  now 
seems  necessary.  Briefly  it  is  this :  Commodities 
are  the  products  of  units  of  average  labor-power. 
Labor-power  is  itself  a  commodity.  Its  cost  is 
the  production  and  maintenance  of  a  labor-man. 
Its  cost  abstractly  is  its  value.  This  value  re- 
appears in  the  commodities  which  it  produces. 
So  that  in  the  Ideal  State,  the  community  of 
goods  would  be  distributed,  one  unit  of  com- 
modity-value to  one  unit  of  average  labor-power 
value  expressed  in  a  common  measure  such  as 
gold.  Rent,  profit,  interest,  speculation,  do  not 
increase  the  mass  of  commodities, — only  average 
labor-power  units  do  that.  Hence  the  units  of 
commodity  value  which  go  to  interest,  rent, 
profit,  speculation,  do  not  go  to  the  labor-power 
value. 

In  a  capitalistic  community,  then,  interest,  rent, 
profit,  speculation  are  said  to  exploit  labor; — 

*The  reader  is  referred  to  The  History  of  Civilization  by  M.  Quizot. 


46  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

that  is  to  say  where  labor-power  is  sold  at  its  ex- 
change value  and  bought  for  its  use-value,  capital 
appropriates  the  difference.  Capital  appropriates 
and  labor  is  expropriated. 

In  three  royal,  octavo  volumes,  Herr  Marx 
works  this  out  with  mathematical  precision.  He 
approaches  the  question  from  every  possible  side, 
deductively,  inductively,  historically,  analytically, 
synthetically.  He  amplifies,  involves,  digresses, 
always  getting  back  to  the  expropriation  point. 
He  is  wonderfully  interesting  and  at  times 
graphic,  never  rhetorical,  but  often  eloquent, 
once  prophetic.  There  is  no  Utopia  in  the  writ- 
ings of  Karl  Marx.  Very  little  is  offered  in  the 
way  of  remedy  and  no  moral  fault  is  found  with 
the  capitalist.  It  is  a  common  mistake  to  assume 
that  Socialism  is  opposed  to  capital  per  se,  but 
Socialists  want  the  title  to  capital  to  vest  in  the 
State  and  not  in  the  individual. 

Marx  is  very  sparing  of  definitions.  This  pas- 
sage comes  the  nearest  to  his  definition  of  surplus- 
value,  though  he  devotes  over  three  hundred 
pages  in  a  stretch  to  that  subject: 

"The  capitalist  who  produces  surplus- 
value, — i.  e.,  who  extracts  un-paid  labor 
directly  from  the  laborers,  and  fixes  it  in 
commodities,  is  the  first  appropriator  but 
by  no  means  the  ultimate  owner  of  this  sur- 
plus-value. He  has  to  share  it  with  capital- 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  47 

ists,  with  land-owners,  &c.,  who  fulfill  other 
functions  in  the  complex  of  social  produc- 
tion. Surplus-value,  therefore,  splits  up  into 
various  parts.  Its  fragments  fall  into  vari- 
ous categories  of  persons  and  take  various 
forms,  independent  the  one  of  the  other,  such 
as  profit,  interest,  merchants'  profits,  rent 
&c."  * 

Marx  bears  heavily  on  social  relations  and  de- 
lights in  drawing  fine  distinctions  where  there 
are  no  real  differences.  I  cite  an  instance  which 
may  have  that  appearance  but  which  in  reality 
is  the  key-note  to  his  whole  theory  and  so  far 
as  I  know  has  not  been  developed  by  any  other 
economist : 

"If  we  now  compare  the  two  processes  of 
producing  value  and  of  creating  surplus- 
value,  we  see  that  the  latter  is  nothing  but 
the  continuation  of  the  former  beyond  a 
definite  point.  If  on  the  one  hand  the  pro- 
cess be  carried  to  the  point,  where  the  value 
paid  by  the  capitalist  for  the  labor-power  is 
re-placed  by  an  exact  equivalent,  it  is  simply 
a  process  of  producing  value;  if,  on  the 
other  hand,  it  be  continued  beyond  that 
point,  it  becomes  a  process  of  creating  sur- 
plus-value." f 

The  subtle  process,  then,  of  exploitation  is  no 
other  than  un'due  length  of  the  work-day  the  ex- 
cess of  which  appears  in  surplus-value,  first  ex- 

•Gapitalby  Karl  Marx,  Vol.  I,  page  618. 
t Cap/fa/ by  Karl  Marx,  Vol.  I,  page  618. 


48  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

pressed  in  use-value,  and  next  expressed  in  com- 
modities, these  commodities  reappearing  in 
money  are  apportioned  to  rent,  profit,  and  in- 
terest. Labor  power  produces  all  the  com- 
modities but  gets  none  of  the  rent,  profit,  or 
interest. 
Marx  has  this  to  say  specifically  about  rent : 

"The  peculiarity  of  ground-rent  is  rather 
that  in  proportion  as  the  conditions  develop, 
in  which  agricultural  products  develop  as 
commodities,  and  in  which  they  can  realize 
their  values,  so  does  property  in  land  develop 
the  power  to  appropriate  an  increasing  por- 
tion of  these  values,  which  are  created  with- 
out its  assistance,  and  so  does  an  increasing 
portion  of  the  surplus-value  assume  the  form 
of  ground-rent."  * 

Marx  lays  down  a  similar  doctrine  with  refer- 
ence to  interest  and  profit.  In  connection  with 
what  he  calls  the  Trinitarian  Formula  this  is 
said: 

"Profit  appears  also  in  practice  what  it  was 
un-deniably  in  theory,  mere  surplus-value, 
a  value  for  which  no  equivalent  is  paid, 
realized  un-paid  labor.  It  was  then  seen 
that  the  investing  capitalist  really  exploited 
labor,  and  the  fruit  of  his  exploitation,  when 
he  worked  with  borrowed  capital,  was  divid- 
ed into  interest  and  profit  of  enterprise,  a  sur- 
plus profit  over  interest."  f 

*Cap/fa7by  Karl  Marx,  Vol.  HI.  page  749. 
t  Capital  by  Karl  Marx,  Vol.  HI,  page  488. 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  49 

Running  through  socialist  literature  on  sur- 
plus-value, is  the  catchy  phrase:  "A  man  is  en- 
titled to  all  he  produces."  But  will  Socialists 
stick  to  this  doctrine?  Let  us  see: 

Suppose  five  Puebla  Indians,  each  working  on 
his  own  hook, — that  is  each  Indian  directing  the 
work  of  his  own  hands, — makes  five  hundred 
sun-dried  bricks  a  day.  A  miner  happens  along 
and  conceives  the  idea  of  making  molds  and 
directing  the  work.  The  molds  are  his  capital. 
He  correlates  the  services  of  the  men  and  directs 
one  to  dig  the  clay,  another  to  pug,  another  to 
mold,  another  to  off-bear,  another  to  tend  the 
drying-yard.  The  result  is  a  thousand  bricks  per 
day  per  man  and  the  product  is  better  than  the 
five  hundred  adobes  made  in  the  old  Indian  way. 
The  work  is  lighter  and  pleasanter.  The  work- 
day is  shorter.  The  miner,  through  the  action  of 
his  mind  applied  to  the  action  of  other  men's 
hands,  has  increased  the  output  one  hundred  per 
cent.  Now,  will  the  Socialist  concede  these 
twenty-five  hundred  bricks  to  him?  No. 

Suppose  further :  The  miner  having  discovered 
his  power  to  direct  and  to  correlate  the  work  of 
other  men's  hands  and  ambitious  to  exercise  this 
power,  searches  out  a  superior  clay  near  a  city. 
He  starts  a  brick-yard;  he  invents  and  installs 
brick-making  machines.  His  enterprise  aug- 
ments the  demand  for  labor.  Wages  rises  twenty- 


50  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

five  cents  a  day.  The  miner  now  becomes  a  Cap- 
tain of  Industry.  He  extends  his  work.  He  em- 
ploys a  superintendent.  Finally  the  whole  of  his 
time  is  spent  in  an  office.  He  wears  good  clothes. 
He  is  seldom  seen.  Quietly  he  works  sixteen 
hours  a  day,  directing  and  correlating  the  work 
of  a  thousand  men.  He  anticipates  demand;  he 
finds  markets ;  he  meets  competition ;  he  finances ; 
he  studies  credits;  he  adopts  new  methods;  he 
economizes  and  reduces  cost  of  production;  he 
reduces  the  price  of  brick  and  increases  the  price 
of  labor : — While  his  brick-makers  are  learning  to 
direct  the  work  of  their  own  hands,  this  Captain 
of  Industry  is  learning  how  to  direct  and  cor- 
relate the  work  of  other  men's  hands,  and  as  his 
business  expands  the  number  of  men  he  employs 
grows  larger  and  larger.  Instead  of  taking  an 
instrument  of  labor  out  of  their  hands  he  has 
put  one  into  their  hands.  At  last  he  builds  up 
a  fortune.  Again,  will  Socialists  concede  that  he 
is  entitled  to  all  he  produces?  No. 

Suppose  again  that  reverses  come  on  and  the 
Captain  of  Industry  loses  money,  prices  decline, 
the  markets  break,  bankruptcy  follows,  the  prop- 
erty is  swept  away  to  pay  mortgages,  debts  and 
wages ;  will  Socialists  concede  that  wage-earners 
should  make  good  the  loss  ?  No. 

And  here  it  should  be  pointed  out  that  in  the 
first  case  only  a  small  part  of  the  surplus-value 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK.  51 

created  by  this  Captain  of  Industry  went  into  his 
fortune, — the  major  part  went  for  material, 
wages,  and  other  expenses  in  a  continuing  busi- 
ness sharing  the  risks  of  a  continuing  business, — 
the  money  was  finally  dissipated  in  the  com- 
munity. The  Captain  of  Industry  by  his  enter- 
prise, talent  for  directing  other  men's  labor,  and 
love  of  exercising  power  was  first  an  accumulator 
of  money,  then  a  dissipator  of  money.  He  prob- 
ably didn't  consume  any  more  wealth  than  many 
of  his  employes.  This  function  of  the  enterpris- 
ing, wealthy  man  seems  not  to  be  understood. 

All  in  all,  then,  I  am  not  inclined  to  deny  the 
theory  of  surplus-value,  but  I  insist  that  it  is 
dissipated  in  the  community  and  in  most  cases 
working-men  get  the  greater  part  of  it.* 

But  what  has  all  this  academic  discussion  to 
do  with  our  subject?  Everything. 

Socialism  conceives  that  value  and  surplus- 
value  belong  to  the  Social  State,  and  through 
the  State  are  to  be  apportioned  among  the 
workers.  In  the  re-action  against  Utopia  and 
the  compulsory,  industrial  army  depicted  in 
Looking  Backward,  the  New  Socialists  have  re- 

*But  "Property  is  Robbery!"  vociferated  M.  Proudhon  with  a  far  deep- 
er insight  into  human  society  than  Herr  Marx  ever  showed.  Inasmuch 
as  Socialists  do  not  accent  Proudhon  as  authority,  I  do  not  feel  called 
upon  to  meet  this  challenge  to  the  present  order  in  the  present  discussion. 
I  will  admit,  however,  that  it  opens  an  interesting  field  of  discussion—one 
which  I  shall  b*  jrlad  to  enter  when  the  issue  framed,  makes  it  relevant. 

Property  exploits  th«  weak  while  Socialism  would  exploit  the  strong" 
is  all  I  need  to  quote  from  M.  Proudhon  whose  eye  was  ever  single  to  his 
peculiar  views  on  "Equality." 


52  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

ceded  from  the  stern  mandates  of  Herr  Marx 
and  waived  the  right  of  the  State  to  inhibit 
private  property  and  invade  personal  rights. 
Conceding  the  right  to  own  private  property 
carries  with  it  the  right  to  interest, — validates 
interest.  Conceding  the  right  to  own  real  estate 
carries  with  it  the  right  to  collect  rent, — validates 
rent.  Marx  concedes  this  in  his  illustration  about 
the  age  of  wine  adding  to  the  value  of  wine.  By 
the  strongest  construction  possible  the  component 
parts  of  surplus-value  are  rent,  interest,  and 
profits.  But  by  waivers  and  concessions  both 
rent  and  interest  have  been  elided  by  the  New 
Socialists,  so  that  the  only  question  left  is  whether 
the  working-man  is  exploited  by  the  way  of 
profits.  Formally  stated  it  stands :  Could  the  so- 
called  working  men  manage  the  industries  of  the 
country  more  economically  than  the  captains  of 
industry?  A  collateral  question,  which  must  be 
met,  is,  who  shall  make  good  the  losses  in  case 
there  is  no  profit? 

Happily  there  is  no  controversy  with  Socialists 
over  the  economy  of  trustification.  It  is  a  part 
of  their  contention  that  "The  prime  justification 
for  the  trust  is,  first,  the  necessity  which  pro- 
duces it,  and,  secondly,  the  economies  which  it 
itself  produces."  And  that  the  "prime  cause  for 
the  formation  of  trusts  is  the  decline  in  com- 
mercial profit."  As  a  rule  they  agree  with  F.  B. 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  53 

Thurber  in  his  report  to  the  United  States  Ex- 
port Association,  wherein  he  says : 

"The  so-called  'trusts'  generally  tend  to- 
ward economy  in  production  and  distribu- 
tion, improved  quality  and  lower  prices  for 
consumers  and  increased  employment  and 
better  wages  for  labor." 

In  proof  of  which  statement  Mr.  Thurber  sub- 
mits several  tables  of  prices,  transportation  rates, 
etc.  Socialists  are  perfectly  consistent  in  this 
admission,  insisting  that  if  a  union  of  corpora- 
tions in  a  trust  result  in  economy,  per  force  a 
union  of  trusts  in  the  State  will  result  in  greater 
economy.  On  this  point  let  me  quote  a  careful 
thinker  and  lucid  writer: 

"There  is  every  reason  to  think  that  social- 
ized capital  would  be  far  less  productive 
than  capital  managed  by  private  owners  for 
private  gain.  The  efficacy  of  the  public 
servant  is  not  to  be  compared  to  that  of  an 
employe  of  a  private  concern.  The  public 
service  in  general,  with  its  red-tape  and 
routine,  its  conservative  and  un-progres- 
sive  spirit,  its  lack  of  enterprise  and  initia- 
tive, its  slowness  and  sense  of  security,  is 
in  its  very  nature  far  less  efficient  than  a 
large  private  corporation.  Seligman  says: 
'Socialism,  if  ever  realized  in  practice,  would 
be  the  death-knell  of  economic  advance  and 
true  social  betterment/  "  * 

*0rthodox  Socialism  :   James  Edward  le  Rossignol,  1 907,  pag«  136. 


54  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

In  a  socialist  speech  in  Chicago,  June  5,  1910, 
Emil  Seidel,  mayor  of  Milwaukee,  is  quoted  as 
saying  that  "monopolies  are  labor-saving  devices 
and  necessary." 

This  statement  is  very  true  in  private  business, 
but  not  true  in  public  business.  Senator  Aldrich 
declares  that  the  annual  budget  of  the  United 
States  could  be  reduced  $300,000,000  if  public 
business  were  done  as  economically  as  private 
business, — that  is,  a  saving  of  nearly  a  million 
dollars  a  day. 

The  government  pays  $17,000  a  year  more  to 
print  its  postage  stamps  than  it  could  get  the 
work  done  by  private  contract. 

In  speaking  of  federal  business,  Hon.  Leslie  M. 
Shaw  shows  how  a  great  deal  of  money  could  be 
saved  under  a  system  of  contracts. 

With  rent  and  interest  eliminated,  I  have 
thought  for  some  time  that  the  most  vulnerable 
point  of  Socialism  is  what  Socialists  regard  as 
their  strongest,  vis.,  surplus- value.  Right  here 
is  where  economists  ought  to  centralize  their 
attacks  upon  the  system.  Profits  apportioned 
among  all  the  years  in  which  they  have  been 
accumulating  and  then  divided  among  all  the 
people  will  be  found  to  be  much  smaller  per 
capita  than  at  first  supposed.  Socialists  now  dis- 
claim all  desire  to  apportion  this  profit ;  then  how 
explain  the  language  of  Marx :  "Expropriate  the 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  55 

expropriators?"  If  not  an  equal  division,  then 
an  unequal,  which  would  be  worse;  but  in  view 
of  the  disclaimer  we  pass  the  matter  of  division. 

In  answer  to  all  this  it  will  not  do  to  say  that 
the  Social  State  would  have  no  such  charges  as 
rent,  interest,  insurance,  losses,  etc.,  to  meet.  The 
purchase  and  up-keep  of  industries  require 
money,  and  national  loans  bear  interest:  To  say 
that  the  fiat  of  the  government  will  take  the 
place  of  money  is  to  fall  back  upon  exploded 
doctrine, — one  which  Herr  Mark  never  adopted 
and  never  sanctioned.  He,  unlike  Proudhon, 
posits  a  sound  money.  In  the  chapter,  On  Ex- 
change, Volume  I,  Das  Capital,  money  is  con- 
ceived to  be  a  "Universal  Equivalent."  Fol- 
lowing this  very  satisfactory  conception  of 
money,  the  writer  says:  "Money  is  a  crystal 
formed  of  necessity  in  the  course  of  exchange, 
whereby  different  products  of  labor  may  be 
equated  to  each  other."  *  *  *  "Although  gold  and 
silver  are  not  money  by  nature,  money  is,  by 
nature,  silver  and  gold, — this  is  shown  by  the 
fitness  of  the  physical  properties  of  these  metals 
for  the  functions  of  money."  These  elementary 
statements  show  how  such  writers  as  Bellamy 
have  missed  the  real  meaning  of  Herr  Marx 
whom  they  assume  to  expound.  Now  returning 
to  the  Social  State : 

Under  the  present  system  we  see  a  large  vol- 


56  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

ume  of  small  profits  taking  the  place  of  a  small 
volume  of  large  profits,  and  the  problem  of 
diminishing  returns  is  already  attracting  much 
attention.*  Where  is  the  warrant  that  Socialism 
could  do  better  ?  If,  however,  a  co-operative  col- 
lectivity can  go  further  in  this  direction  than  the 
present  organization  of  industry,  with  its  quick 
turn-overs,  small  profits,  risks,  and  losses,  So- 
cialists are  free  to  demonstrate  the  fact  in  any 
county,  in  any  state,  in  the  Union, — no  law 
estops,  no  custom  prevents.  But  this  brings  us 
right  back  to  the  experiment  of  Robert  Owen, 
Louis  Blanc,  Charles  Fourier,  John  Alexander 
Dowie,  the  Icarians,  the  Shakers,  the  Menonites, 
the  Doukabors,  the  Brook  Farm,  and  precisely  as 
it  brings  us  there,  it  brings  us  to  failure, — failure 
without  a  single  exception.  Utopia,  then,  raises 
a  warning  finger;  its  watch- word  is  Beware! 

But  why  did  Utopia  fail?  It  was  under  the 
leadership  of  great  men.  Circumstances  favored 
and  the  times  favored.  Fortunately  we  have  the 
reasons  given  by  an  enthusiastic  adherent,  Josiah 
Warren,  a  scion  of  that  New  England  stock 
which  made  its  name  famous  in  the  Revolution- 
ary War: 

"Personal  liberty  was  at  a  discount,  in- 
centive to  sustained,  individual  effort  was 

*  The  Vanishing  Profit,  an  address  by  Charles  F.  Beach,  Jr. ;  also  article, 
in  Quarterly  Journal  ofEconQmics  for  August  by  Adolphe  Landry, 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  57 

lacking,  and  each  was  inclined  to  ascribe  the 
faults  of  the  system  to  the  short-comings 
of  his  neighbors."  * 

Mr.  Warren  is  speaking  after  two  years  per- 
sonal experience  in  New  Harmony,  and  what 
he  says  is  the  intuitive  feeling  of  nine  men  out 
of  ten.  Socialists  have  never  insisted  upon  high 
standards  of  morality  and  personal  character. 
Their  profoundest  scholar  and  thinker,  Karl  Rod- 
bertus,  reflecting  alone  upon  his  German  farm, 
tacitly  admits  this  in  his  writings  and  as  tacitly 
admits  its  weakness.  This  accounts  for  the  fact 
that  Rodbertus  never  got  further  than  to  form- 
ulate and  elaborate  the  doctrine  that  Labor  costs 
Labor  and  that  Laborers  are  born  to  beget 
Laborers. 

Emerson  saw  the  same  thing,  hence  he  says: 
"I  like  best  those  strong  and  worthy  persons  who 
support  the  social  order  without  hesitation  or 
misgiving."  Professorial  Socialism  and  Social- 
ists of  the  chair  who  lecture  at  the  Rand  School 
in  New  York,  or  in  the  Parteischule  in  Berlin, 
might  do  well  to  quote  this  saying  of  Emerson 
as  well  as  that  of  his  Owenite  townsman,  Mr. 
Warren. 

Yielding  to  an  inborn  abhorrence  of  a  com- 
pulsory, industrial  army,  the  New  Socialism 
makes  concession  to  personal  liberty.  But  this 

Vos/aA  Warren,  by  William  Bailie,  1906,  page  6. 


5  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

concession  will  not  quiet  criticism.  Practical 
questions  arise:  How  is  the  New  Social  State 
to  perform  its  functions,  so  multiplied  and  mani- 
fold, without  arbitrary  power?  Unless  there  be 
an  industrial  army,  under  the  command  of 
despotic  officers,  how  are  the  workers  to  be  as- 
signed to  their  duties  and  the  balance  nicely  ad- 
justed among  the  various  industries?  Surely 
caprice  and  whim  are  not  to  control.  Without 
a  mathematical  accounting  vested  in  a  supreme 
authority,  how  are  the  commodities  to  be 
distributed?  Without  an  official  bureau  of 
styles,  qualities,  and  fashions,  how  are  the  styles, 
qualities,  and  fashions  of  goods  to  be  determined  ? 
Why  will  there  be  any  rivalry  to  sell  goods  ?  any 
advertising?  any  window  dressing?  any  display 
signs?  any  attractive  lighting?  any  stores,  except 
warehouses  with  narrow  doors  and  windows  and 
indifferent  but  polite  clerks?  Why  will  there  be 
any  commercial  ambition?  invention?  discovery? 
rivalry?  competition? 

If  it  be  true  that  all  men  want  in  order  to  refine 
their  minds  and  enlighten  their  morals  is  food, 
clothing,  and  shelter,  why  are  not  soldiers  the 
most  humane,  chaste,  and  intellectual  of  all 
classes  ? 

If  bodily  comfort  alone  refines  the  senses,  why 
do  not  rich  men's  sons  such  as  Harry  Thaw  make 
the  very  best  citizens  ?  Why  do  not  the  nobility 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  59 

in  aristocratic  governments  monopolize  all  good 
works,  lead  off  in  scientific  attainment,  and  be- 
come models  for  mankind  to  follow? 

Whose  influence  is  most  inspiring  to  American 
youth,  that  of  the  proletarian,  Governor  Johnson 
of  Minnesota,  or  that  of  a  beautiful,  satiated  but- 
terfly flitting  between  Lake  Superior  and  the 
Florida  coast? 

How  are  similarities  of  mind,  tastes,  and  char- 
acteristics, to  be  secured  so  there  will  be  a  com- 
bined perception?  an  agreement  of  purposes? 
"a  concert  of  wills?  a  harmony  of  actions?" 

I  admit  that  an  organization  of  humanity  and 
industry  "for  the  good  of  the  whole  community, 
whether  practical  or  not,  is  a  magnificent  ideal." 
I  admit  that  altruism  enriches  and  ennobles, — 
"without  social  service,  man  would  become  a 
savage."  And  yet  altruism  has  its  limits.  "If 
every  man  sacrificed  his  own  happiness  all  would 
be  unhappy,"  while,  on  the  other  hand,  if  every 
man  made  himself  honorable  all  would  be  honor- 
able. John  Stuart  Mill  says: 

"It  is  yet  to  be  determined  whether  com- 
munist schemes  are  consistent  with  the  de- 
velopment of  human  nature;  those  mani- 
fold un-likenesses,  that  diversity  of  tastes, 
and  talents,  and  variety  of  intellectual  views 
which  not  only  form  a  great  part  of  the  in- 
terest in  human  nature,  but  by  bringing  in- 
tellects into  stimulating  collision  and  by  pre- 


60  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

senting  to  each  innumerable  notions  that  he 
would  not  have  conceived  of  himself,  are  the 
mainspring  of  mental  and  moral  progress." 

In  Campanula's  City  of  the  Sun,  men  are  ab- 
sorbed in  collectivism.  All  peoples  constitute 
one  flock  under  one  shepherd  and  he  is  the  King 
of  Spain.  The  dogs  are  charged  to  bring  stray- 
ing sheep  into  the  fold  and  if  any  desist,  to  devour 
them  on  the  spot. 

In  contrast  with  that,  consider  another  picture 
drawn  in  a  great  tragedy :  Well-to-do  Ella  Rent- 
heim,  dying  of  a  life-love  unrealized,  says  to 
John  Gabriel  Borkman,  dying  of  a  money-lust 
also  unrealized:  "You  have  taken  from  me  my 
life-love.  *  *  *  You  have  robbed  me  of  the 
joys  and  hopes  of  motherhood;  you  have  robbed 
me  of  the  sorrows  and  sufferings  of  motherhood. 
*  *  *  I  shall  not  leave  behind  one  single 
human  being  who  will  remember  me  lovingly 
and  mournfully  as  a  son  thinks  of  a  mother  he 
has  lost;  when  I  die  the  name  of  Rentheim  dies 
with  me;  it  is  a  torturing  thought  to  be  wiped 
out  of  existence, — even  your  very  name.  *  *  * 
You  have  murdered  my  soul  and  you  have  mur- 
dered your  own  soul !" 

Of  these,  who  sounded  human  nature  the 
deeper  and  the  truer,  Campanella  or  Ibsen  ?  And 
the  working-man, — will  he  serve  everybody  better 
than  somebody, — himself? 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  6l 

THE  SAVING  REMNANT  INDICATED 

The  Bureau  of  the  Census  estimates  that  the 
census  of  1910  will  show  a  population  of  nearly 
90,000,000  in  continental  United  States,  with  a 
voting  strength  of  23,000,000.  Over  8,000,000 
of  these  voters  are  engaged  in  agricultural  pur- 
suits and  over  4,000,000  of  the  rest  own  urban 
homes.  These  two  classes  forming  a  body  of 
12,000,000  voters  may  be  set  down  as  solidly  op- 
posed to  Socialism. 

Of  the  remaining  11,000,000  it  is  safe  to  say 
that  one-half  own  some  personal  property.  And 
who  are  the  men  who  own  this  personal  prop- 
erty? Precisely  the  men  who  have  shared  the 
surplus-value,  for  if  there  were  no  surplus-value 
there  would  be  no  progress.  Let  me  cite :  I  can 
give  the  names  and  addresses  of  a  score  of 
Swedes  in  one  county  in  Iowa  who  started  to 
work  on  a  railroad  section  at  $1.15  a  day  who  now 
own  live-stock,  houses,  and  land  in  fee-simple, 
amounting  in  value  to  more  than  $50,000  each. 
In  the  same  county  I  can  give  the  names  and 
addresses  of  more  than  a  hundred  Germans  who 
began  as  month  hands  and  now  own  property 
to  the  value  of  more  than  $50,000  each.  Note 
how  the  retail  fruit  and  vegetable  trade  of  Chi- 
cago has  passed  into  the  hands  of  Greek  peddlers 
and  further  note  the  names  of  the  firms  in  South 


62  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

Water  street, — names  of  Italian  wholesalers  who 
began  their  business  careers  empty  handed.  I 
cite  these  cases  to  show  how  surplus-value  has 
been  apportioned  down  among  the  masses  and 
not  absorbed  in  its  entirety  by  the  Captains  of 
Industry.  It  is  just  as  reasonable  to  say  that 
Labor  has  expropriated  Capital  as  it  is  to  say 
that  Capital  has  expropriated  Labor.  The  truth, 
however,  is  that  both  have  shared  in  the 
division. 

In  support  of  the  last  statement  a  friend  tells 
me  that  he  can  give  the  names  and  addresses  of 
over  a  thousand  workmen  in  one  shop  who  have 
credits  in  Chicago  savings-banks.  A  large  num- 
ber of  the  employes  of  the  United  States  Steel 
Corporation  own  shares  in  the  concern  and  it  is 
not  uncommon  to  find  employes  of  the  Illinois 
Central  Railroad  Company  who  are  shareholders. 
I  know  a  case  in  which  one  share  of  the  Com- 
pany's stock  is  owned  by  three  boys  who  bought 
it  with  their  joint  earnings  and  savings. 

Gallant  Tom  Watson  graphically  says  in  the 
February  number  of  his  1910  magazine  that  the 
Negroes  in  this  country  own  property  in  the 
aggregate  amounting  to  $300,000,000.  Despised 
and  starting  with  nothing: 

"Had  there  been  a  grain  of  truth  in  the 
Karl  Marx  idea,  the  Negroes  of  the  South 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  63 

would  not  now  be  worth  so  many  millions 
of  dollars  acquired  since  1865." 

Consider  the  farmers:  *  In  1874,  there  were 
20,000  granges  or  lodges  of  the  Patrons  of  Hus- 
bandry in  the  United  States  with  dues  to  the 
National  Grange  of  over  $300,000.  (These 
figures  are  taken  from  Simons? s  American 
Farmer,  a  Socialist  authority).  The  Grangers 
sought  (i)  to  abolish  the  middle-man;  (2)  to 
establish  supply-houses ;  (3)  to  regulate  the  rail- 
roads; (4)  to  control  grain  elevators  and  sell 
grain  direct  to  millers.  At  one  time  two-thirds 
of  the  grain  elevators  in  Iowa  were  in  the  hands 
of  the  Grangers.  A  mere  remnant  of  the  Grange 
exists  to-day.  Why  ?  Because  the  Grange  found 
that  the  middle-man  fills  a  useful  office  and  where 
he  can  be  eliminated,  the  fierce  rivalry  in  busi- 
ness ousts  him.  Note  the  growth  of  the  mail- 
order houses,  the  5-Cent  and  lO-Cent  stores 
which  are  preparing  the  way  for  25-Cent  and 
loo-Cent  stores,  economies  which,  I  regret  to  say, 
are  making  inroads  upon  the  local  dealer.  But 
after  the  Grange  came  the  Anti-Monopolists,  the 
Farmers'  Alliance,  the  Populists,  the  Knights  of 
Labor,  the  Greenbackers, — all  popular  movements 
and  all  moving  in  the  direction  of  Political  So- 
cialism :  And  all  to-day  extinct !  Nobody  is  now 

*See  Plate  II  Special  Census  Report  for  1 904,  showing  per  cent  of 
farmers  and  men  engaged  in  Manufacturing  and  Mechanical  Pursuits. 


64  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

asking  that  loans  be  advanced  by  the  sub- 
treasury  of  the  United  States  to  farmers  and 
planters  on  their  crops  of  grain  and  cotton ; — this 
socialist  doctrine,  like  the  rest,  has  fallen  by  the 
way-side. 

A  good  half  of  the  voters  in  this  country  are 
free-holders.  It  is  safe  to  say  they  will  never 
vote  with  a  party  which,  on  the  defensive,  is  im- 
pelled to  declare  that  it  does  not  favor  the  ex- 
propriation of  rents.  A  good  half  of  the  other 
half  own  some  personal  property  and  for  the 
same  reason  applied  to  interest  will  not  vote  in 
favor  of  Socialism  or  socialistic  measures. 

But  deeper  than  all  this,  underlying  the  funda- 
mental propositions  of  Socialism,  is  the  fact  that 
its  success  would  be  a  failure.  In  administrative 
success  it  would  lead  to  a  dreary,  monotonous, 
uneventful,  un-enterprising  life: — Lack  of  in- 
terest is  intolerable.  Granting,  then,  everything 
possible  to  Political  Socialism,  construing  it  in 
the  most  liberal  manner,  conceding  good  motives 
to  it,  even  accepting  all  its  concessions  and 
waivers  to  established  order,  we  are  compelled  to 
conclude  that  it  offers  no  panacea  for  social  un- 
rest or  disorder. 

Shall  it  be  said,  then,  that  Political  Socialism 
has  served  no  good  purpose  ?  that  it  ought  to  re- 
ceive anathema  of  every  good  citizen?  Not  at 
all.  Socialism  has  stimulated  political  thought 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  65 

the  results  of  which  we  see  in  a  re-examination  of 
the  basis  upon  which  our  system  of  government 
rests.  It  has  opened  many  a  man's  eyes  to  the 
danger  of  an  invasion  of  personal  and  state  rights. 
The  truth  is  that  as  individual  man  brings  him- 
self under  self-control  and  our  civilization  dif- 
fuses itself,  we  ought  to  move  in  the  direction 
of  less  law  and  more  individual  freedom  instead 
of  more  law  and  less  individual  freedom.  So- 
cialism has  served  to  make  this  point  of  danger 
clear. 

Socialism  is  inspired  in  extravagant  optimism 
in  the  future.  There  is  some  good  in  that. 
However  much  or  however  little  this  good,  it 
will  finally,  as  a  saving  remnant,  be  incorporated 
into  the  policies  of  other  parties  and  there  go  on 
to  its  perfect  work  even  as  the  practical  features 
of  the  old  Grange  movement  were  finally  absorb- 
ed into  other  and  more  rational  programmes. 

And  here  is  danger, — the  danger  of  yielding 
too  much  to  the  demand  for  legislation.  Every- 
where the  spirit  is  rampant  of  seeking  remedies 
in  law  rather  than  in  building  up  character  and 
self-dependence.  The  tendency  is  to  lay  blame 
for  failure  on  somebody  else, — on  government 
or  society.  This  tendency  is  deplorably  weaken- 
ing. But  action  re-acts.  Hence  we  have  a 
healthful  movement  spontaneously  arising  out  of 
a  multiplicity  of  state  law,  to  repeal  and  simplify 


66  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

and  harmonize  by  an  identity  of  state  law.  Wit- 
ness the  late  convention  of  state  governors  and 
proceedings  of  the  National  Civic  Federation. 

It  may  justly  be  said  by  Anti-Socialists  that 
I  have  no  right  to  take  for  granted  that  the 
waivers  and  concessions  of  the  New  Socialists 
are  made  in  good  faith, — that  these  are  only  the 
sharp,  shrewd,  tactical  maneuvers  of  practical 
politicians, — that  the  socialist  movement  should 
be  attacked  without  gloves  and  without  qualifica- 
tion. Even  so,  but  my  present  purpose  is  mainly 
to  show  that  in  admitting  the  failure  of  Utopia, 
the  New  Socialism,  without  qualification,  destroys 
its  own  foundation  and  admits  its  own  defeat.  In 
doing  this  I  yield  none  of  the  ground  occupied 
by  Anti-Socialists  per  se. 

It  should  not  escape  the  reader  that  I  am  here 
dealing  with  principles  and  not  with  mere  num- 
bers. As  matter  of  fact  Socialism  is  growing  in 
all  the  first  class  nations:  Witness  the  recent 
election  of  Emil  Seidel  as  mayor  of  Milwaukee 
and  with  him  a  socialist  council. 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  67 


CHAPTER  III. 

POLITICAL  SOCIALISM —SHALL  IT  BE 

PUT  UPON  THE  DEFENSE? 

HOW?    WHY? 

THE  FARMER  AGAINST  SOCIALISM. — THE  HOME-OWNER 
AGAINST  SOCIALISM.— LABOR-UNIONS  IN  PART  AGAINST 
SOCIALISM. — STRONG  SENSE  OF  PROPRIETORSHIP. — SOCIAL- 
ISM OF  THE  CHAIR  HAS  NO  SYMPATHY  FOR  THE  CAP- 
TAIN OF  INDUSTRY  AND  THE  SCHOOL  OF  HARD-KNOCKS  ; 
IT  WOULD  SUFFER  MOST  IN  CATACLYSM  OF  ITS  OWN 
MAKING. 

What  chance  of  success,  in  this  country,  has 
Political  Socialism?  None  whatever.  This 
question  ought  to  be  raised  in  all  seriousness  and 
answered  in  all  confidence.  The  answer  above  is 
the  natural  one.  By  that  I  mean  that  it  is  the 
answer  of  logic,  good  sense,  and  natural  condi- 
tions. However,  this  answer  pre-supposes  that 
Socialism  shall  be  put  upon  the  defensive.  De- 
fault is  dangerous. 

The  most  casual  observer  cannot  fail  to  notice 
that  our  literature;  colleges;  churches;  uni- 
versities; newspapers;  magazines;  humanitarian 
and  reform  associations;  women's  clubs;  and  a 
good  one-half  of  the  un-organized,  so-called 
apostles  of  brotherly  love,  are  tinctured,  yea, 
saturated  through  and  through,  with  a  soft, 


68  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

sweet,  optimistic  form  of  the  socialist  move- 
ment. This  singular  aspect  of  social  affairs  very 
naturally  and  very  properly  raises  a  collateral  in- 
quiry :  What  harm  can  all  these  sentimental,  al- 
truistic, well-intentioned  people  do? 

In  contrasting  dynamic  Socialism  with  its  pas- 
sive form,  a  little  further  on,  I  shall  take  up  this 
collateral  question  and  try  to  show  wherein  the 
danger  lies.  With  the  observation  that,  so  far, 
our  practical  politics,  as  reflected  in  congress  and 
state  legislation,  has  happily  escaped  an  open 
alliance  with  Socialism,  though  the  recent  elec- 
tion of  Mr.  Berger  to  Congress  from  a  Wisconsin 
district  and  the  Reading  and  Milwaukee  elections 
clearly  show  that  city  governments  may  pass  into 
the  hands  of  Socialists,  I  proceed  to  indicate  how 
the  socialistic  movement  may  be  put  upon  its 
defense, — that  means  its  defeat. 

THE  FARMER  AGAINST  SOCIALISM 

Not  counting  a  play  upon  some  of  its  fantastic 
features,  I  have  said  that,  so  far,  our  practical 
politics,  as  reflected  in  federal  and  state  legisla- 
tion, has  escaped  an  open  alliance  with  Social- 
ism. So  much  cannot  be  said  of  our  municipal 
politics.  This  circumstance  shows  that  the  rural 
population  is  not  come  under  the  influence  of  the 
movement.  So  much  could  not  be  said  fifteen 
years  ago.  The  fiat  money  scheme  of  that  time 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  69 

was  purely  socialistic.  The  sub-treasury  scheme 
of  government-advances  on  crops  of  grain  arid 
cotton  was  likewise  socialistic.  The  Patrons  of 
Husbandry,  the  Farmers'  Alliance,  the  Green- 
backers,  the  Populists,  all  advocated  measures, 
in  a  way,  socialistic.  (Later  and  closer  study 
has  shown  that  these  policies  had  a  European  and 
a  historic,  revolutionary  origin.)  To-day  these 
movements  are  practically  extinct. 

Thus  it  is  easily  seen  that  self-acting  causes 
have  largely  expunged  socialistic  principles  from 
among  the  farmers.  Now  this  ground  ought  to 
be  held  intact  by  Anti-Socialists, — it  is  the 
natural  base  of  operations  against  a  militant 
Socialism. 

"Why?"  Because  the  farmer  has  a  high 
respect  for  property.  Coupled  with  this  high 
respect  for  property  is  a  strong  sense  of  pro- 
prietorship. When  awakened,  this  sense  of  pro- 
prietorship (a  fact  utterly  ignored  by  the  High- 
thought  Fabian  Society  of  England)  comes  near 
being  a  ruling  motive  in  men's  minds.  It  is  not 
necessary  to  go  to  the  farms  for  it  but  there  it 
may  be  seen  in  its  best  and  highest  form.* 

*This  is  noticeable  even  in  country  children.  Many  a  time  little  boys 
left  in  my  office  for  safekeeping  while  their  parents  were  out  trading, 
have  told  me  about  their  pigs,  calves  and  sheep  as  though  the  well-being 
of  the  whole  farm-yard  depended  upon  them.  I  have  seen  the  eyes  of 
little  girls  pop  out  wide  as  they  told  me  about '  their"  little  chickens,  and 
the  wicked  excursions  of  a  predatory  weasel  seemed  to  take  hold  of  them 
as  a  personal  loss  Many  a  country  editor  has  storied-up  these  childish 
narratives  with  great  success. 


70  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

Now  this  sense  and  motive  of  proprietorship, 
overlooked  by  the  High-thoughtists,  give  a  fixity 
to  character ;  they  develop  purpose  and  determin- 
ation ;  they  give  direction  and  stability ;  they  culti- 
vate the  family  instinct  and  promote  family  rela- 
tions. Perchance,  after  a  tax  upon  large  testa- 
mentary properties,  farmers  will  resist  to  the  ut- 
most any  and  all  attacks  upon  the  laws  of  in- 
heritance. 

There  is,  too,  a  re-inforcing  reason  why  the 
farmer  will  not  take  kindly  to  Socialism, — that 
is  his  hard  training  toward  the  practical  side  of 
all  worth-while  affairs.  He  realizes  that  in  our 
country  is  an  immense  territory  cut  up  into  farms 
both  great  and  small.  A  certain  portion  of  the 
work  on  these  farms  is  light  and  agreeable  but 
another  certain  portion  is  heavy,  urgent,  and  dis- 
agreeable. 

The  farmer  knows  that  for  the  State  to  con- 
fiscate the  land  and  undertake  to  run  these  farms 
would  mean  ruin, — not  only  ruin  to  the  State  but 
to  the  real-estate  as  well.  He  knows  that  for 
labor-checks,  hands  are  not  going  to  work  twelve, 
fourteen,  and  sixteen  hours  a  day ;  and  he  knows 
that  there  isn't  one  town-man  in  ten  who  can 
run  a  farm  and  make  it  pay.  With  live-stock, 
especially  at  folding-time,  to  be  managed;  with 
crops,  just  on  the  turn,  to  be  cut  and  garnered 
quickly;  with  seeds,  at  just  the  right  time,  to  be 


A  BUSY   MAN  S  BOOK  Jl 

selected  and  saved;  with  intricate  machines  to 
be  handled;  with  fences  to  be  watched;  with  a 
make-ready  for  storms  always  in  hand,  farmers 
know  that  this  whole  theory  of  socializing  land — , 
condemning  rents  as  the  Marxites  propose,  is  no 
less  Utopian  now  than  it  was  in  the  days  of 
Robert  Owen,  yea,  more  so,  because  farm-man- 
agement is  more  highly  evolved  and  more  diffi- 
cult than  it  was  when  New  Harmony  failed. 

To  the  practical  mind  of  the  farmer,  the  land- 
scheme  of  the  Socialist  seems  little  short  of 
ridiculous.  He  knows  that  of  bosses  and  straw- 
bosses,  of  superintendents  and  managers,  of 
secretaries  of  agriculture  and  chiefs  of  bureaus, 
of  captains,  colonels,  generals,  and  generalis- 
simos,— it  would  take  as  many  as  there  would 
be  privates,  to  apportion  the  men  and  to  keep 
them  at  work, — and  then  such  work  done  under 
a  policeman's  club,  with  no  more  interest  in  re- 
sults than  have  those  men  in  fantastic  garb  whose 
victuals  are  pushed  to  them  through  square  holes 
in  an  iron  door, — a  dog-watch  on  dry  land. 

"Hold,"  cries  a  high-sheriff  of  the  socialistic 
State,  "that's  antiquated  doctrine.  We  have 
repudiated  Karl  Kautsky  and  Karl  Rodbertus. 
We  have  set  aside  Karl  Marx's  three  hundred 
pages  of  argument  on  surplus-value  and  its 
largest  component,  rent.  We  are  not  going  to 


72  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

confiscate  your  land.  Keep  it.  We'll  only  take 
the  crops! 

If  the  high-sheriff  is  right  what  becomes  of 
the  cry  for  "Opportunity?"  Opportunity  to  get 
to  the  land?  to  the  mines?  to  the  instruments  of 
labor?  to  the  means  of  production? — The  truth 
is  that  Political  Socialism  must  stick  to  Philo- 
sophic Socialism.  It  must  stick  to  the  dogmas 
of  Marx  and  Rodbertus  or  it  disintegrates  as  in 
the  hands  of  Wells  and  Spargo  and  falls  to 
pieces  of  its  own  accord.  As  I  tried  to  show  in 
a  previous  article,  if  its  concessions  and  waivers 
to  the  present  order  be  made  and  taken  in  good 
faith,  they  cut  the  very  ground  from  under  it. 
It  destroys  itself.  "Suicide  is  confession." 

In  his  last  book,  The  Substance  of  Socialism, 
Mr.  Spargo  has  such  a  care  lest  he  offend,  that 
his  work  amounts  to  a  defense  of  established 
order, — he  dilutes  in  order  to  strengthen. 

But  now  come  Arthur  M.  Lewis,  William 
Morris,  Mr.  Hyndman,  et  al  protesting  against 
the  waivers  and  concessions  of  Sir  Oliver  Lodge, 
Sidney  Webb,  Mr.  Shaw  et  al,— "You  must 
reckon  with  us,"  they  say,  "we  are  the  genuine, 
evolutionary,  industrial  Socialism  with  a  political 
programme.  We  Marxites  are  not  dilutionists 
with  mythical  views,  mythical  objects,  and 
mythical  programmes; — we  represent  the  living, 
driving,  organic,  dynamic  force  of  the  true  doc- 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  73 

trine."  There  is  some  truth  in  this  and  the  so- 
cialist question  is  not  fully  dealt  with,  leaving 
them  out.  I  shall  not  fail  to  consider  that  phase 
of  the  matter. 

These  Marxites,  however,  only  make  it  the 
less  difficult  to  combine  the  eight  million  farm 
voters  in  this  country  against  socialist  meas- 
ures. These  farmers  make  a  nucleus  of  a  good 
one-third  of  the  voters  to  begin  with  and  in  ad- 
dition a  large  number  of  town  and  city  people 
who  either  own  lands  or  have  an  expectancy  in 
the  titles  to  lands.  Besides  there  is  another 
very  considerable  element  whose  sympathies  can- 
not be  divorced  from  the  farm. 

Socialists  themselves  realize  this  fact.  At  the 
Socialist  Congress  held  in  Chicago,  May  21, 
1910,  Victor  L.  Berger  said: 

"If  we  don't  have  the  farmers,  we  can't 
have  Socialism  in  this  country.  If  you  try 
to  take  the  land  away  from  12,000,000 
farmers  you'll  have  a  job  on  your  hands; 
you  might  as  well  try  to  reach  down  the 
moon." 

At  the  same  congress,  A.  M.  Simons  said: 

"You  cannot  succeed  without  the  farmers 
any  more  than  you  can  change  the  orbit  of 
the  comet." 

So  the  "Farmer  Question"  was  deferred,  the 
committee  enlarged  and  ordered  to  report  in 


74  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

1912.  All  this  means,  also,  that  the  day  is  not 
far  distant  when  the  New  Englander  who  used  to 
sneer  at  the  Granger  of  the  West  will  be  ex- 
ceedingly glad  to  accept  and  to  acknowledge  the 
conserving  influence  and  support  of  the  erst- 
while Granger. 

In  short,  as  long  as  the  helm  of  the  Ship  of 
State  is  in  the  hard,  firm  grip  of  the  farmer  and 
his  hard,  clear  but  perhaps  stubborn  head  is 
helping  to  guide  the  vessel,  there  need  be  little 
fear  that  State  Socialism  will  get  control  of  the 
"means  of  production,  exchange,  and  distribu- 
tion." 

Of  course  I  am  not  un-aware  that  by  talking 
palliatives  and  a  progressive  policy,  Socialists 
claim  to  have  made  inroads  in  rural  districts 
especially  among  the  prune-growers  of  Oregon. 
But  I  never  heard  one  of  those  prune-growers 
after  he  had  learned  what  the  full  programme 
meant  and  after  the  policy  of  "Activity"  had 
been  expounded  to  him,  more  especially  by  female 
agitators,  stand  his  ground  as  a  Socialist, — not 
one.  Neither  did  I  ever  hear  a  practical  farmer 
endorse  the  doctrine  after  he  came  to  see  it  in  all 
its  phases, — not  one. 

Hence  it  may  be  safely  concluded  that  all  the 
farmer  needs  is  information.  And,  that  there 
may  be  no  reasonable  ground  for  doubt  or  dis- 
pute, I  suggest  that  this  information  be  taken 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  75 

from  socialistic  sources. — Is  it  not  safe  to  con- 
clude, then,  that  the  farmer  may  be  counted  upon 
to  aid  enthusiastically  in  driving  State  Socialism 
back  upon  itself  and  into  a  position  of  self- 
defense? 

HOME-OWNERS  AGAINST  SOCIALISM 

Four  million  voters  in  the  United  States  own 
homes  in  cities  and  towns.  On  all  hands  it  is 
allowed  that  the  home-maker  and  the  home- 
owner is  a  loyal  friend  to  that  institution  known 
as  the  Family.  Moreover,  he  recognizes  sov- 
ereignty. He  respects  authority.  He  believes 
in  government.  He  upholds  law.  These  urban 
and  village  home-owners  will  consolidate  to  a 
man  against  revolutionary  Socialism. 

Let  me  cite  a  circumstance  which  shows  how 
State  Socialism,  in  success,  would  run  counter 
to  men  of  substance  and  affairs.  This  circum- 
stance, at  the  same  time,  shows  how  deeply 
the  appetite  to  manage  property  and  how  natural 
the  desire  to  enjoy  the  private  liberties  which  go 
with  and  are  a  part  of  home-ownership  are 
implanted  in  the  human  breast: 

The  town  of  Pullman,  twelve  miles  from  Chi- 
sago,  was  founded  in  1880.  It  was  laid  out  and 
built  by  the  Pullman  Palace  Car  Company.  This 
company  bought  four  thousand  acres  of  land 


76  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

and  spent  a  million  dollars  on  the  tract  before  a 
house  was  to  be  seen  on  it.  The  land  was 
graded,  drained  and  sewered,  and  piped  for 
filtered  water  and  illuminating  gas.  It  was  made 
sanitary  by  the  best  engineering  skill  procurable. 
Landscape  gardens  were  laid  out  on  the  grounds 
with  wide  drive-ways,  broad  walks,  meandering 
lawns,  and  an  artificial  lake.  Trees  were  set 
out.  Flower-beds  and  grass-plots  were  planted 
and  embroidered  with  foliage-plants.  A  clock- 
tower  was  installed,  likewise  a  water-tower,  and 
a  band-stand  where  free  concerts  were  given 
once  a  week.  Vista  Lake,  a  sheet  of  water  more 
than  three  acres  in  extent,  was  outfitted  for 
boating,  swimming  and  winter-sports.  At  one 
time  Arcade  Park  and  Vista  Lake  were  famous 
pleasure-grounds  and  Arcade  Theater  ranked  as 
the  very  best  found  in  sub-urban  places.  Pull- 
man became  known  as  the  City  of  Brick.  The 
houses  were  some  2-story  and  some  3-story. 
The  tenants  were  provided  with  every  conven- 
ience for  heating,  lighting,  laundering,  cooking, 
and  so  forth.  Flats  of  two  rooms  rented  for 
from  $5.00  a  month  to  $10.00  a  month.  Flats 
of  four  rooms  rented  for  from  $n.oo  a  month  to 
$14.00  a  month.  This  City  of  Brick  had  a  mag- 
nificent hotel,  a  free  gymnasium,  a  free  library, 
and  a  free  reading-room.  It  had  its  own  school 
and  a  large  green-stone  church.  The  dwellings 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  77 

were  near  the  Pullman  shops  in  which  most  of 
the  tenants  worked.* 

Could  Socialism  do  more? 

Six  years  after  Pullman  was  founded,  I  spent 
a  day  in  the  place. 

I  soon  discovered,  especially  among  the  Ger- 
man cabinet-makers,  that  all  was  not  satisfactory. 
The  workmen  reluctantly  told  me  that  on  the 
start  their  families  were  delighted  but  of  late 
many  of  them  were  becoming  dissatisfied.  I 
pressed  a  Swiss  wood-carver  who  was  getting 
five  dollars  a  day  to  go  into  particulars : 

"Veil, — yuh  see  ate  ees  dhese  vay, — mine 
vife,  she  liket  to  raise  som'e  schickens." 

"Yes,  but  there's  no  profit  raising  chickens 
in  the  city  is  there?" 

"Veil,— I  not  can  tell  'bout  dhot,— but  mine 
vife, — she  liket  to  fool  mit  'em  any  how." 

"Oh,— but  how  about  you?" 

"Veil  sir, — I  not  can  object  to  see'n  dhose  leetle 
fel-ers  runnen  'roun  mysel-lf. — A  schicken  in 
dhe  pot  ees  a  fur-rst  rate  dhing  fur-r  Sunday 
any-how, — I  thol  yuh  dhot."  *  *  * 

The  question  now  comes  how  did  this  Pullman 
experiment  turn  out? 

*Por  further  facts  relating  to  Pullman,  the  reader  is  referred  to  the  re- 
port of  Commissioners  of  State  Labor  Bureaus  signed  by  Carroll  D. 
Wright  and  others  in  which,  alter  citing  a  number  of  industrial  towns 
in  this  country  and  Europe  including  the  enterprise  of  H«rr  Krupp  at 
Essen,  the  Commission  say :  "Pullman  stands  at  the  head." 


?  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

After  a  while  the  tenants  began  to  tire  of  the 
formality  and  sameness  of  the  place.  They  began 
to  long  for  the  exercise  of  the  sense  of  proprietor- 
ship. They  began  to  buy  houses  in  the  neighbor- 
hood and  move  out  of  Pullman.  All  kinds  of 
trivial  complaints  were  set  on  foot.  One  of  the 
worst  strikes  known  in  the  history  of  the  country 
came  on.  The  social  arrangements  of  this 
ideally  equipped  and  appointed  city  did  not  and 
could  not  satisfy.  Six  years  after,  I  again  visited 
the  place  and  found  that  the  divisional  lines  be- 
tween Pullman  and  Chicago  had  been  wiped  out 
and  the  place  was  fast  merging  itself  into  the 
great  city, — as  a  municipal  entity,  it  was  gone 
and  many  of  its  socialistic  features  were  pro- 
nounced a  failure.  Upton  Sinclair  knew  of 
Pullman,  yet  he  preferred  to  place  his  Jurgis  in 
the  slums  and  it  may  be  pertinent  to  ask  whether 
the  House  Helicon  was  any  nearer  a  success  than 
the  Town  Pullman. 

On  my  second  visit,  I  hunted  up  the  Swiss 
wood-carver  and  found  him  contented  in  a  house 
of  his  own  though  the  conveniences  fell  far  short 
of  those  in  the  City  of  Brick.  While  we  were  talk- 
ing, his  wife  came  in,  clad  in  an  old  dress,  and 
an  older  sun-bonnet.  She  had  been  out  on  the 
common,  digging  in  the  earth  with  an  old  case- 
knife,  and  filling  a  half-dozen  old  peach-cans  with 
black  dirt.  In  these  she  could  grow  little  gera- 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  79 

niums,  pinks,  and  roses.  The  beautiful  gardens  in 
Pullman  were  outside  of  herself.  The  little  pink 
in  the  peach-can,  weakling  though  it  might  be, 
was  something  she  could  tend,  water,  and  fuss 
with.  It  was  a  part  of  herself, — the  product  of 
her  own  care,  forethought,  and  toil.  It  was  some- 
thing she  could  love.  It  stirred  the  emotions  in 
her  heart  and  the  aspirations  in  her  brain, — 
the  best  feelings  God  had  given  her, — it  helped 
to  satisfy  the  sense  of  proprietorship. 

So  the  dream  of  George  M.  Pullman,  his 
City  Beautiful, — a  Working  Man's  Champs 
Elysees, — with  its  twelve  thousand  inhabitants, 
was  swallowed  up  in  the  great,  common  city  of 
Chicago. 

And  right  here  an  important  corollary  is  to  be 
noted,  viz:  That  one  of  the  most  effective  ways 
to  put  Socialism  on  the  defensive  is  to  encourage 
home-building.  The  history  of  the  movement,  in 
other  countries,  shows  that  peasant  ownership  of 
land,  chattels,  and  houses,  is  what  it  fears  most. 
As  home-ownership  increases,  agitation  de- 
creases. Hence,  there  is  little  need  to  add  that 
the  home-owner  may  be  counted  upon  to  aid 
powerfully  in  putting  State  Socialism  on  the 
defensive  and  out  of  existence. 


80  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

LABOR  UNIONS,  IN  PART,  AGAINST 
SOCIALISM 

In  an  article  recently  published  under  the  title, 
Two  Irreconcilable  Foes,  &c.,  Ralph  M.  Easley 
shows  how  what  he  calls  "the  revolutionary 
socialistic  body,"  is  the  "vindictive,  unrelenting 
enemy  of  organized  labor."  He  says: 

"Socialists  oppose  Labor  Unions  because 
they  are  securing  shorter  hours,  better 
wages,  and  better  conditions  for  working- 
men,  achievements  which  are  fatal  to  so- 
cialistic philosophy  and  its  desire  to  make 
things  worse  as  fast  as  possible  in  order  to 
pave  the  way  for  the  Social  revolution."* 

Mr.  Easley  then  goes  on  to  cite  case  after  case 
in  which  Socialists  attack  the  leaders  of  organized 
labor.  Now  these  cases  comport  exactly  with 
what  I  shall  say  further  on.  They  add  piquancy 
to  the  fact,  ofttimes  overlooked,  that  Socialist- 
leaders,  in  many  places  both  in  Europe  and  this 
country,  are  seeking  to  control  the  Unions  for 
the  identical  purpose  of  promoting  that  "Social- 
ist-revolution," The  question,  then,  is :  Will  the 
Unions  lend  themselves  to  promoting  and  realiz- 
ing this  purpose? 

Not  entirely. 

I  am  free  to  say  that  that  answer  is  returned 

*N&tional  Civic  Federation  Review,  1 909  November  number. 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  8l 

by  a  layman  and  not  by  one  having  authority 
but  it  is  supported  for  two  reasons: 

First,  the  Unions  are  under  strong  leadership. 
These  leaders  know  that  without  good  returns 
to  capital,  good  wages  is  impossible. 

Contrawise,  Socialist-leaders  contend  that  good 
returns  are  exploited  out  of  labor  by  way  of 
surplus-value.  Hence  they  are  forced  to  main- 
tain that  the  greater  the  returns  the  greater  the 
exploitation  and  the  less  the  wages.  Labor-lead- 
ers know  that  profits  inspire  enterprise  and  that 
without  enterprise,  the  labor-market  would  be 
emasculated.  Wages  depends  upon  Supply  and 
Demand  and  enterprise  creates  the  demand. 
These  labor-leaders  know  also  that  to  make  the 
Rich  poor  will  not  make  the  Poor  rich. 

Contrawise,  Socialist-leaders  are  forced  to 
maintain  that  a  down-pull  of  enterprise  would 
be  an  up-lift  of  un-enterprise. 

Second,  labor-leaders  are  surely  cognizant  of 
the  fact  that  socialistic  influences  have  hurt 
their  organizations.  Not  a  strike  of  more  than 
local  consequence  may  be  called  to  mind  but  what 
large  numbers  of  irresponsible  tramps,  hoboes, 
outlaws,  renegades,  and  desperadoes  at  once 
flocked  to  the  scene.  The  violence  which  these 
mutinous  characters  and  intentionally  un-em- 
ployed  precipitate  with  black-jack,  paving- 
stones,  sling-shots,  bricks,  dirks,  and  revolvers, 


82  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

enrage  the  public  and  in  part,  at  least,  bring  the 
Unions  and  their  cause  into  disrepute.  That  was 
true  in  case  of  the  Pittsburg  riots,  in  1877,  when 
the  Union  station  was  burned  and  when  long 
strings  of  freight-cars  were  rushed,  forced,  and 
burglarized.  It  was  the  case,  in  1886,  when  the 
long  agitation  in  Chicago  for  an  8-hour  day 
resulted  in  the  Hay-market  riots.  It  was  the  case 
in  the  Pullman  strike,  in  1894,  when  cars  were 
turned  over,  set  fire  to,  looted,  and  burned, — 
when  blood-shed  in  the  railroad  yard  at  Ham- 
mond was  charged  up  to  the  strikers. 

Of  course,  nice  old  ladies  in  silk  gowns,  and 
becoming  slippers  who  meet  in  drawing-room 
clubs  and  discuss  a  soft,  sweet,  socialistic 
method  of  solving  the  servant  question  and  of 
getting  their  dishes  washed  by  a  State  bureau 
of  Dish-washers  and  of  having  their  cakes  and 
bakers'-bread  delivered  by  another  State  bureau, 
would  not  sanction  these  red-handed  proceed- 
ings,— but  once  abetting  how  can  they  prevent? 

Of  course  these  nice,  old  ladies  condemn  but 
in  that  they  are  not  good  Socialists,  for,  not  a 
Socialist-leader  in  this  country  or  in  the  Old 
country  condemns.  Why?  Because  Socialist- 
leaders  fancy  that  these  outbreaks, — this  taste  for 
blood, — "paves  the  way  to  the  Social  revolution." 
And  because  the  facts  are  that  many,  very  many, 
of  the  floating,  bad  and  dangerous  men  who 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  83 

hasten  to  the  scene  of  the  strikes  are  Socialists, 
they  are  Socialists  per  se. 

A  third  reason  might  be  assigned  which  some- 
how, a  moment  back,  was  overlooked :  Socialists 
demand  equal  recognition  for  both  sexes,  all 
nations,  tribes,  colors,  tongues,  and  kindreds. 
Karl  Marx  was  founder  of  the  International 
Working-man's  Association.  This  policy  could 
end  only  in  putting  the  American  mechanic  and 
the  American  laborer  on  a  level  with  the  Jap- 
anese mechanic  and  the  Chinese  coolie, — a  thing 
which,  in  self-defense,  the  Unions  have  resisted 
from  the  very  first  and  which  they  will  keep  on 
resisting  to  the  very  last.  The  recent  socialist 
Congress  at  Chicago  came  near  splitting  on  the 
question  of  immigration.  John  Spargo  of  the 
committee  presented  a  minority  report  and  the 
debate  lasted  four  days.  Finally  a  resolution 
offered  by  Morris  Hillquit  of  New  York,  strad- 
dling the  question,  was  adopted.  This  act  indi- 
cates another  concession  to  established  order. 

The  logic  of  the  situation,  then,  leads  to  the 
belief  that  the  Unions  could  not  solidify  their  or- 
ganizations to  carry  out  the  programme  of  the 
Socialists.  Many  Unionists,  especially  the  skill- 
ed men,  have  savings  laid  away  in  banks  and 
trust  companies,  others  own  shares  of  stock  in 
the  companies  for  which  they  work,  and  still 
others  have  life-insurance  policies  carried,  per- 


84  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

haps,  for  years, — so  that  they  have  a  prime,  per- 
sonal interest  in  maintaining  order  and  in  resist- 
ing the  "Social  revolution."  It  will  not  be  sur- 
prising if  some  of  the  strongest  enemies  to  the 
socialist  State,  which  the  future  may  develop, 
shall  be  members  of  the  Unions  of  organized 
labor. 

A  second  corollary  which  here  may  be  pointed 
out  is  that  it  would  seem  to  be  good  policy  for 
corporations  to  encourage  the  purchase  of  stock 
by  their  men  and  then  to  make  the  holding  of 
this  stock  as  easy  as  possible. 

PROFESSORIAL  SOCIALISM  AND  THE 
SCHOOL  OF  HARD-KNOCKS 

What,  if  anything,  may  be  done  to  check  the 
spread  of  Socialism  in  and  through  and  by  our 
churches,  schools,  and  colleges? 

Very  little,  I  fear. 

Just  as  long  as  men  allow  their  reasoning 
powers  to  be  dominated  by  their  feelings,  just  so 
long  will  Socialism-of-the-Chair  have  influence. 
When  the  professors  are  confronted  with  a  cat- 
aclysm, as  they  will  be,  somewhere  and  somehow, 
then  conditions  will  change.  This  Professorial 
Socialism  does  not  aim  to  be  revolutionary.  I 
hold,  however,  that  it  may  be  met  logically  and 
philosophically,  on  its  own  ground.  Without 
going  into  the  complicated  system  of  nerve-im- 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  85 

pressions  and  motory  reactions  which  it  involves, 
let  me  see,  in  a  few  words,  if  I  can  indicate  what 
I  mean? 

The  professors  tell  us  that  there  is  a  New 
Psychology  or  rather  a  new  psycho-physical  view 
of  the  mind  in  which  the  old  notion  of  simple, 
mental  faculties  is  sent  to  the  limbo  of  discarded 
things.  By  a  process  of  laboratory  experiments, 
the  investigators  claim  to  have  discovered  that  all 
mental  activities  are  accompanied  by  brain  activi- 
ties ;  that  mental  states  have  parallel  brain  states ; 
that  all  the  contents  of  the  mind, — perceptives, 
emotions,  memories,  imaginations,  et  cetera, — 
have  parallel  states  in  the  brain;  and  that  there 
are  two  sets  of  these  parallel,  accompanying 
states.  One  set  emanates  in  the  mind,  they  are 
the  purpose-states.  The  other  set  emanates  in  the 
brain,  they  are  the  causal-states. 

Now,  the  purpose-states  are  the  higher  part 
of  a  man's  mental  endowment, — the  will,  the 
emotions,  the  moral  sense ;  it  is  the  free  part  and 
cannot  be  formulated  or  conceived  of  as  cause- 
and-effect.  It  is  a  law  unto  itself. 

The  operations  of  the  causal-part  may  be  con- 
ceived as  a  procession  passing  by,  formulated  and 
understood  by  well  defined  laws  of  cause-and- 
effect.  Such  is  a  brain-state  caused  by  the  action 
of  light,  sound,  cold,  heat,  pleasure,  pain,  touch, 
muscular  sense  and  the  like. 


86  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

Now,  in  the  interplay  of  brain  and  mental 
activities,  the  Socialist  has  little  regard  for  any 
but  the  causal.  In  effect  he  takes  advantage  of 
the  causal-part  of  the  mind  to  ignore  the  purpose- 
part.  He  would  force  the  higher  part  of  us 
mentally  down  into  the  lower  part.  Such  a  view 
of  life  makes  us  mechanical,  empty,  trivial,  with 
little  aspiration  and  no  inspiration, — slaves  to  out- 
side forces,  the  mere  effects  of  outside  causes. 

This  view  is  perfectly  consistent  with  the 
Economic  Interpretation  of  History, — it  is  Marx- 
ian and  Comteian  combined.  How  can  it  be 
otherwise  with  the  accent  of  life  laid  upon  the 
material?  Eat  and  drink,  to-morrow  we  die. 
But  we  are  now  treating  of  the  professors.— 
And  verily,  Good  Masters,  this  is  a  moral  uni- 
verse, ruled  by  moral  law;  "as  a  man  sows  that 
shall  he  also  reap:"  If  he  play  the  horses,  or 
the  markets,  or  fail  in  business  judgment,  or  fall 
in  the  face  of  temptation, — the  blame  is  not  on 
Society,  on  him.  Society  is  made  by  men,  not 
men  by  Society.  Jehova  made  this  world,  "not 
the  Devil."  Why,  I  know  men  who,  but  a  few 
years  ago,  got  into  Chicago,  dear  knows  how, 
whose  capital  was  two  English  words  and 
just  money  enough  to  borrow  a  wheel-barrow. 
They  mortgaged  their  equity  in  the  wheel-bar- 
row to  buy  a  bushel  of  bananas, — to-day  their 
names  are  written  in  the  gold-leaf  signs  of  whole- 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  87 

sale  firms  in  South  Water  street.  Society  didn't 
write  those  names  in  gold  and  it  couldn't  write 
them  off  if  it  wanted  to.  Truth  to  be  told,  this 
is  a  moral  universe.  "As  a  man  sows  that  shall 
he  also  reap." 

Such  are  the  contradictions  which  arise'  when 
the  reason  gives  way  to  the  feelings, — the  main 
thing  which  a  college  education  is  supposed  to 
forestall.  But  preaching  aside. 

Primarily,  the  professor  has  no  sympathy  for 
the  Captain  of  Industry, — a  man  who  generally 
receives  his  education  in  the  School  of  Hard- 
Knocks, — therefore,  I  see  no  way  to  check  the 
spread  of  Professorial  Socialism.  I  know  that 
at  the  first  positive  sign  of  a  cataclysm,  it  will 
try  to  un-do  the  mischief  it  has  done,  with  what 
prospect  of  success,  I  shall  indicate  in  the  next 
chapter. 


Notes:  In  the  LaMonte-Mencke  Debate,  New  York,  1910.  effort  is 
made  to  discredit  the  Natural  Selection  of  Darwin,  including  evolution  in 
the  germ  and  to  return  to  the  theory  of  cataclysm,  thus  sanctioning  revo- 
lutionary Socialism :  "Belief  is  based  upon  desire  and  desire  is  based 
upon  economic  conditions ;"  cataclysm  is  seen  to  be  desired. 

How  Socialists  have  been  forced  to  change  their  views  in  the  last  ten 
years  is  amply  set  out  in  The  New  Socialism  <&c. .  by  Jane  T.  Stoddart, 
London,  1910;  "The  practical  aim  is  to  secure  the  ownership  of  the  means 
of  production  for  the  community  and  the  means  of  consumption  for  the 
individual."  As  the  latter  grows  out  of  the  former  the  aim  is  as  chimer- 
ical as  to  try  to  reform  Society  without  taking  the  trouble  first  to  reform 
the  individual.  Spargo's  doctrine  of  socializing  private  property  only 
which  may  be  the  means  of  exploitation,  is  far  more  plausible. 

The  papal  encyclical  of  Leo  XIII.  On  Labor  should  be  read  by  every 
earnest  student  of  current  economics. 


88  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 


CHAPTER  IV. 

POLITICAL  SOCIALISM— WHAT  DO  NON- 
SOCIALISTS  SAY  OF  IT? 

A  REVIEW  OF  THE  STRENGTH,  ORGANIZATION  AND  INFLUENCE 
OF  GERMAN  SOCIALISM,  FRENCH  SOCIALISM,  BRITISH 
AND  AMERICAN  SOCIALISM. — NOMENCLATURE  REVOLU- 
TIONARY.— RED  FLAG,  THE  EMBLEM  OF  BLOOD. — SOCIAL- 
ISM FLOURISHES  ONLY  IN  RICH  COUNTRIES,  THIS 
STRANGE  FACT  ACCOUNTED  FOR. — -AMBITION  AND  APPE- 
TITE.— REVOLUTIONARY  ORIGIN. — PLAYING  WITH  REVOLU- 
TIONARY FIRE. — THE  BROKEN  WINE  CASK. — PASSION  FOR 
BLOOD,  ONE  THOUSAND  BURIED  IN  A  SINGLE  GRAVE. — 
MEETING  OF  REVOLUTIONARY  SOCIALISTS  DESCRIBED. — 
LIGHTS  PUT  OUT. — CONCLUSION. 

Thus  far,  I  have  treated  Socialism,  if  not  from 
a  non-partisan  standpoint,  certainly  in  a  non- 
partisan  spirit.  I  have  cited  more  socialist 
authority,  three  to  one,  than  I  have  cited  non- 
socialist  authority,  and  I  am  conscious  of  no  dis- 
position to  misrepresent.  But  I  now  propose  to 
summarize  hastily  the  argument  from  a  partisan 
standpoint, — that  of  a  Non-Socialist.  For  this 
purpose,  it  will  be  best  to  arrange  the  review 
under  different  heads : 

i.  How  are  we  to  account  for  the  almost 
universal  prevalence,  in  the  richest  countries, 
of  the  socialist  movement?  The  working-class 
in  every  nation  in  Europe,  from  rim  to  center,  is 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  89 

honey-combed  with  it.  In  the  German  Empire 
it  has  an  enrolled  membership  of  600,000  mem- 
bers who  pay  assessments  into  the  central 
treasury.  Its  annual  income  is  nearly  $300,000 
and  of  this  it  puts  over  $100,000  into  its  reserve 
fund.  This  reserve  fund  is  secret,  kept  in  secret 
archives,  and  is  supposed  to  amount  to  millions 
of  dollars.  There  are  seventy  daily  socialist 
newspapers  in  Germany  with  over,  a  million 
subscribers  and  an  organized  propaganda  is  con- 
stantly issuing  books,  tracts,  pamphlets,  and  sta- 
tistical reports.  It  maintains  a  school  in  Berlin 
with  six  professors.  It  keeps  traveling  organizers 
and  lecturers  in  the  field.  It  controls  close  to 
three  million  votes  and  has  fifty-four  seats  in  the 
Reichstag  of  whom  Herr  Bebel  is  one  of  the 
ablest  debaters  in  that  parliament.  Its  pro- 
gramme hitherto  has  been  one  of  intransigence, 
lately,  however,  it  seems  to  be  making  alliances ; 
and  the  Opportunists  or  Revisionists  bid  fair  to 
control  the  party's  methods. 

In  England  there  are  six  socialist  parties 
ready  at  the  touch  of  a  match  to  co-operate  and 
coalesce.  The  total  voting  strength  is  difficult 
to  arrive  at  on  account  of  its  blending  with  the 
labor  vote,  perhaps  near  half  a  million.  Social- 
ists have  eight  seats  in  the  royal  parliament  and 
close  affiliations  with  the  Labor  members.  The 
Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer,  David  Lloyd- 


QO  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

George,  is  practically  regarded  as  a  Socialist. 
The  Fabian  Society,  closely  allied  with  the 
Liberals,  is  made  up  mostly  of  Intellectuals  many 
of  whom  like  H.  G.  Wells,  Sidney  Webb,  G. 
Bernard  Shaw,  Graham  Wallis,  and  Sir  Oliver 
Lodge  are  conceded  to  be  men  of  a  high  order  of 
intelligence  and  character.  The  Socialists  of  Eng- 
land pay  more  than  half  a  million  dollars  an- 
nually into  the  treasuries  of  their  "branches," 
parties,  and  societies  while  they  raise  another  half 
million  for  incidental  expenses.  Their  propa- 
ganda reaches  from  the  soap-box  orator  in  Traf- 
algar Square  to  the  dilettante  in  court  circles. 

France  has  a  Socialist  in  her  cabinet,  a  large 
number  of  socialist  members  in  her  Chamber  of 
Deputies,  and  several  city  governments  in  control 
of  the  communes.  Collectivist  communes. 

The  voting  strength  of  Socialists  in  the  United 
States  is  not  far  from  800,000  and  the  propa- 
ganda keeps  up  a  constant  agitation  through 
its  3,200  "branches"  or  "locals"  with  50,000  pay- 
ing members ;  through  its  newspaper  press,  trav- 
eling organizers,  lecturers,  pamphlets,  books, 
conventions,  congresses,  debates,  and  other  forms 
of  controversial  growth.  It  has  a  school  in  New 
York  City  endowed  by  Mrs.  Rand  formerly  of 
Burlington,  Iowa,  heiress  of  a  fortune  made  in 
what  is  called  by  the  Socialists,  the  Lumber 
Trust.  Some  of  the  most  active  and  enthusiastic 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  91 

propagandists  are  women.  Just  now,  Socialists 
in  this  country  are  centering  their  fight  on  the 
federal  constitution  and  the  courts.  The  Four- 
teenth Amendment  and  the  Dartmouth  College 
Case  seem  to  arouse  their  special  enmity  and  they 
bitterly  attack  the  early  fathers  of  the  republic 
claiming  that  "property  was  preferred  to  per- 
sons." Its  organization  reaches  into  forty-two 
states. 

On  the  Continent,  Socialism  primarily  aims  to 
control  the  communes.  In  England,  the  fight  is 
made  to  shape  legislation  in  the  municipalities. 
The  London  County  Council  is  so  far  under 
socialist  influence  that  while  annual  taxes  have 
increased  £100,000,000,  sterling,  the  debt  of  the 
city  has  increased  £400,000,000,  sterling, — the 
same  spirit  was  noted  in  Kansas  in  populist  days 
when  bills  were  introduced  in  that  state's  legis- 
lature appropriating  more  than  money  enough  to 
pay  the  national  debt,  and  the  Milwaukee  Social- 
ists ask  the  loan  of  a  million.  The  situation,  ju^t 
now,  is  very  interesting  because  the  Liberal  Party 
is  charged  with  being  in  sympathy  with  the 
Fabians  an.d  other  societies, — much  of  the  stress 
in  the  recent  campaign  was  due  to  that  alleged 
influence. 

Everywhere,  Socialists  greet  each  other  as 
"Comrades"  (or  in  equivalent  terms)  and  every- 
where, they  seek  to  solidify  those  who  have  no 


92  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

property,  in  the  Class-War,  against  those  who 
have  property.  The  New  Social  State  is  their 
final  object  and  a  Social  Democracy  is  to  be  the 
means  of  realizing  this  State.  Up  with  the  Class- 
War  and  down  with  Surplus-value  is  their  war- 
cry. 

2.  Everywhere,  the  nomenclature  of  Social- 
ism is  revolutionary,  showing  its  common  origin.* 
Everywhere,  the  Red  Flag  is  the  party  emblem, 
showing  that  this  common  origin  has  still  a  com- 
mon significance, — the  Red  Flag  is  the  emblem 
of  human  blood.     Everywhere  the  Marseillaise 
is  its  revolutionary  war-song,  perverting  a  noble 
expression  for  liberty  into  an  expression  for  ex- 
propriation. 

3.  How  shall  we  account  for  this  so  nearly 
universal  movement?    How  account  for  its  com- 
mon  motive   and    common    emblem?    its    com- 
mon   watchwords    and    common    revolutionary 
song?     Its  common  dialect  and  other  means  of 
expression?     Other  political  parties  and  move- 
ments are  national.     This  one  is  international. 
The  Tory  party  of  England  has  no  influence  in 
France,  neither  has  the  Bourbon  party  of  France 
any  influence  in  this  country.    But  the  Socialists 

*A  few  of  these  revolutionary  words  follow:  equalitarian,  authoritarian, 
revolutionaire,  proletaire,  bourgeoisie,  expropriate,  exploit,  militairiste. 
quatre-vignt-treize,  communiste,  intellectual,  industrial,  &c. 

Among  words  which  have  become  affiliated  with  these  may  be  noted: 
laboriste,  confiscationiste,  paciflciste,  compensationiste,  parliamentair- 
iste,  intransigence,  Red  Republican,  Red  Cap,  Red  Flag,  municipaliste, 
Class-War,  possiblista,  opportunists  progressiviste.  revisioniste,  pro- 
fessionaliste,  syndicalism,  commandeering,  collectivity. 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  93 

are  influential  in  all  three,  they  permeate  all  the 
richest  and  most  civilized  nations  to  the  very 
depths. — Great  political  movements  have  a  cause, 
a  motive,  a  driving,  organizing  force.  They  are 
not  born  out  of  nothingness, — they  are  not  mean- 
ingless.— We  must  look,  then,  into  human  passion 
for  this  motive  of  Socialism, — at  once,  we  find  it, 
— Ambition  and  Appetite.  Hence,  we  find  the 
geist  of  the  movement  fifty  years  before  the  word 
Socialism  is  known. 

The  appetite  here  considered  is  the  appetite 
for  property.  Its  appeal  is  based  upon  the  as- 
sumption that  men  who  have  property  have  ob- 
tained it  by  despoiling  the  poor.  The  imagina- 
tion is  aroused  and  passion  inflamed.  Men 
become  frenzied  under  the  impression  that 
they  have  been  wronged.  Some  become 
wild,  fanatical,  desperate.  Others  espouse 
Socialism  like  a  new  religion;  they  become  re- 
signed, possessing  themselves  of  the  happy  idea 
of  a  New  Social  State  wherein  Big  Tom  is  to 
be  pulled  down  and  Little  Harry  pushed  up,  until 
all  are  Dicks. 

The  property  class  is  not  understood  by  the 
propertyless  class.  The  fact  is  that  the  first  is 
chiefly  engaged  in  accumulating  property  so  that 
it  may  be  disbursed  in  wages,  expenses,  and 
other  forms.  It  finds  its  way  back  into  the 
channels  of  business.  I  know  a  man  worth  a 


94  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

million  who  doesn't  consume  as  much  as  his 
neighbor  worth  a  hundred. 

.No  people  ever  advanced  in  science,  art,  phil- 
osophy, humanitarianism,  enlightenment  until  it 
had  some  reserves  in  its  wealth, — until  it  had 
what  the  poor  regard  as  a  leisure-class,  though 
this  supposed  leisure-class  may  be  engaged  more 
hours  daily  in  hard  work  than  the  proletarian. 
Only  yesterday,  I  heard  a  man  who  serves  as 
watchman  in  an  automobile-shop  curse  the  owner 
as  the  latter  rode  by.  Suppose,  now  that  busi- 
ness reverses  close  that  shop,  how  much  bet- 
ter off  will  the  watchman  be?  In  searching, 
then,  for  the  organic,  driving  power  of  Socialism, 
we  find  it  in  the  fusion  of  Ambition  and  Appetite, 
— the  Appetite  for  Property.  An  appetite  which 
Socialism  excites,  but  does  not  appease:  Social- 
ism does  not  understand  itself. 

4.  Very  naturally  the  next  inquiry  must  be, 
Does  history  bear  out  this  contention  and  this 
doctrine?  Let  us  see: 

However  impractical,  theoretical,  and  oratori- 
cal may  have  been  the  Girondists  of  the  French 
Revolution,  I  cannot  help  but  regard  them  as 
among  the  most  brilliant  and  patriotic  men  who 
ever  lived.  Their  purpose,  that  of  limiting  the 
Bourbon  dynasty  with  a  constitution,  was  a  noble 
purpose.  The  downfall  of  the  Bastile  was  a 
splendid  culmination  of  that  great  political  move- 


95 

ment.  But  unconsciously  and  unwittingly  this 
political  revolution  ignited  the  fires  of  an 
economic  revolution. 

Some  of  the  Girondist  leaders  unwittingly  and 
unconsciously  played  with  the  fires  of  this  other 
revolution, — of  a  sudden  it  burst  forth  and  all 
Paris  was  enveloped.  Mirabeau  had  gently  play- 
ed with  this  revolutionary  fire,  he  saw  it  getting 
beyond  his  control  and  fever-stricken  he  passed 
away.  The  fire  passed  on  to  Danton. 

Danton  played  with  this  revolutionary  fire  till 
it  got  beyond  his  control  and  his  head  was 
sheared  away  by  the  guillotine.  Before  this,  he 
had  passed  the  fire  on  to  Hebert. 

Hebert  played  with  the  revolutionary  fire  till 
it  got  beyond  his  control  and  his  head  was 
sheared  away  by  the  same  guillotine.  The  fire 
passed  on  to  Robespierre. 

Robespierre  played  with  the  same  revolution- 
ary fire  till  it  got  beyond  his  control  and  his 
head  was  likewise  sheared  away  by  the  same  guil- 
lotine. 

Within  a  hundred  feet  of  where  Lafayette  lies 
buried  in  the  cemetery  of  the  Picpus  are  the 
bodies  in  one  grave  of  over  a  thousand  victims 
of  the  French  revolution.  Louis,  the  Much  Be- 
loved ;  Marie  Antionette,  whose  last  noble  words 
were,  "I  shall  not  answer  such  a  question  put  to  a 
Mother;"  Madame  Roland  whose  life  went  out 


96  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

as  she  said:  "O  Liberty,  what  crimes  are  com- 
mitted in  thy  name," — in  all  twenty-six  hundred 
were  put  to  the  sword  and  the  guillotine  and  a 
hundred  millions'  worth  of  property  destroyed. 
Then  came  Napoleon  and  quenched  this  revolu- 
tionary fire  with  an  iron-fist, — the  revolution  went 
out  in  a  worse  despotism  than  that  under  which 
it  came  in:  Danton  could  have  quenched  that 
revolutionary  fire,  had  he  not  played  with  it.  In 
that  revolution  the  Red  Flag  was  first  carried; 
the  Marseillaise  was  first  sung;  the  Carmagnole 
first  danced ;  the  title,  Citoyen,  first  addressed  to 
men ;  the  words,  Bourgeoisie,  Proletaire,  and  ex- 
propriate first  came  into  use. 

Now,  who  were  the  classes  who  overrode  the 
political  aspirations  of  the  French  Revolution 
and  converted  it  into  the  Reign  of  Terror  of 
1793, — quatre-vingt-treize, — words  dear  to  all 
socialist  hearts  ?  It  was  the  Proletariate.  It  was 
the  spirit  of  Dynamic  Socialism, — Ambition  and 
Appetite  fused  together.  It  was  the  spirit  of 
expropriation  apotheosized  by  Karl  Marx  and 
Karl  Kautsky. 

In  his  Tale  of  Two  Cities,  Charles  Dickens 
gives  a  remarkable  description  of  this  proletarian 
spirit  as  it  was  aroused  in  the  dance  of  the  Car- 
magnole and  he  describes  its  personal  character- 
istics in  the  scene  where  a  wine-barrel  rolls  from 
a  cart,  bursting  a  stave  and  instantly  from  the 


A  BUSY   MAN  S  BOOK  97 

cellars,  garrets,  and  hidden  places  swarmed  the 
Proletaire  and  stopped  not  till  every  drop  of  the 
spilled  wine  was  licked  up  from  the  paving- 
stones. 

There  is  now  going  the  rounds  of  the  5-cent 
theater-shows  a  wonderful  motion-picture  of  the 
guillotining  of  Charlotte  Corday, — the  revolution- 
ary scene  of  the  Committee  of  Safety  should  be 
witnessed  by  every  American  who  thinks  there  is 
no  danger  in  men's  appetites. 

But  Danton  could  have  quenched  that  fire,  so 
could  have  the  King,  so  the  law-abiding  and  law- 
loving  people  in  this  country  can  quench  it  if 
they  do  not  play  with  it. 

In  the  insurrectionary  outbreak  of  1848,  the 
proletarian  movement, — spirit  unbroken, — boldly 
assumed  the  name  of,  Socialism,  and  under  the 
leadership  of  Louis  Blanc  forced  the  government 
to  open  National  Workshops.  As  we  have  seen, 
these,  failed.  Then  came  open  blood-shed. 
Socialists  fought  under  the  Red  Flag  and  at  one 
time  demanded  that  it  be  made  the  national  color, 
taking  the  place  of  the  Tri-color.  In  the  final 
collision  ten  thousand  men  were  either  killed  or 
wounded  but  Socialism  was  defeated  and  public 
order  again  restored.  The  Insurrection  of  1848 
demonstrated  that  Socialism  is  at  least  a  Pan- 
European  movement,  ready  to  break  out  when- 
ever and  wherever  the  Proletariate  sees  a  chance 
to  despoil  the  Bourgeoise  of  its  property. 


98  POLITICAL  SOCIALISM 

The  next  violent  struggle  of  the  Proletariate 
was  in  1871.  In  speaking  of  this  insurrection, 
W.  Lawler  Wilson,  who  has  given  great  atten- 
tion to  what  Mr.  Spargo  calls  the  geist  of 
Socialism,  says : 

"The  Communist  movement  in  Paris  was 
in  direct  line  of  descent  from  the  Commune 
of  1793.  From  the  Red  Republicanism  of 
the  Reign  of  Terror  down,  it  had  retained  its 
original  power  over  the  Proletariate  and 
naturally  so,  because  it  was  their  own.  The 
pike  and  Red  caps  of  1793  (quatre-vignt- 
treize) ;  the -pikes  of  1830;  the  Red  flags  un- 
successfully raised  in  1848;  the  Red  Flag 
temporarily  triumphant  in  1871  these  are 
the  symbols  at  once  of  the  continuity  and 
evolution  of  the  movement."  *  *  *  "In 
principle;  in  administrative  form;  in  its 
Proletarian  constitution;  in  its  insurgent 
origin ;  in  its  megalomania ;  in  its  grasping  at 
the  power  of  the  police ;  in  its  measures  and 
palliatives;  its  secularism;  confiscation;  its 
pauperizing  policy,  the  Commune  of  1871 
was  the  direct  heir  of  the  Commune  of  1793. 
Its  foundation  is  celebrated  to-day  through- 
out Europe  as  the  one  great  event  in  the 
socialist  year."  * 

These  periodical  insurrections  covering  a 
period  of  one  hundred  and  twenty  years  show 
the  character  of  dynamic  Socialism,  the  persist- 

*The  Menace  of  Socialism  by  W.  Lawler  Wilson,  London  1 909,  pages 
191  and  195. 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  99 

ency  of  an  Appetite  spurred  by  Ambition.  A  re- 
markable thing  about  these  insurrections  is  that 
they  generally  occur  just  after  a  war  when  the 
nation  is  weakened  in  men  and  money  and  in  the 
least  best  condition  to  grapple  with  an  internal 
enemy. 

It  will  be  noticed  that  these  insurrections  are 
about  a  generation  apart  though  I  am  not  trying 
to  forecast  when  the  next  will  break  out;  and 
this  for  the  sufficient  reason  that  when  once  on 
their  guard,  the  American  people  will  make  short 
work  of  exploiters  and  exploitation. 

A  SOCIALIST  MEETINq 

Not  unreasonably  the  reader  may  ask  for  a  little 
more  than  mere  opinions  concerning  the  geist  of 
dynamic  Socialism  especially  as  many  of  its 
speakers  and  writers  in  America  proclaim  loudly 
that  they  favor  a  peaceful  revolution  and,  in  no 
wise,  council  blood-shed  or  violence  or  anything 
but  the  most  beautiful  evolution  into  a  govern- 
ment of  brotherly  love  and  sisterly  affection. 
"Activity"  is  no  part  of  their  programme. 
Caesar's  Column  was  only  a  clevef  figure  of 
speech  contrived  by  Ignatius  Donnelly.  Colonel 
Jesse  Harper  spoke  without  authority.  And 
these  kind  people  for  the  most  part  mean  what 
they  say. 


100  POLITICAL   SOCIALISM 

There  is,  however,  another  class  dangerous  and 
audacious  in  the  extreme.  It  dominates  socialis- 
tic conventions  and  policies;  it  is  worldly-wise, 
selfish,  intolerant,  impertinent,  over-bearing,  con- 
temptible,— I  mean  the  Russian  Ex-Jew  who  puts 
himself  forward  at  every  socialist  meeting  and 
with  astonishing  volubility  attacks  American 
laws,  constitutions,  and  institutions.  The  self- 
respecting,  law-abiding,  wealth-creating  Jews  in 
this  country,  the  rabbis,  ought  to  lose  no  time  in 
denouncing  these  non-descripts  and  putting  the 
mark  of  Cain  upon  them  and  all  their  works.  I 
come  now  to  what  I  meant  by  giving  a  little  more 
than  mere  opinion : 

In  1900,  I  had  lodgings  in  a  hotel,  known  as 
pension,  at  the  corner  of  Rue  Clair  and  Rue 
Saint  Dominique.  Facing  Rue  Clair  but  two 
doors  from  the  corner  were  the  buildings  of  this 
arrondissement.  A  campaign  came  on  in  the  fall 
for  the  election  of  a  new  Chamber  of  Deputies 
and  a  hall  in  this  public  building  was  used  for 
campaign  headquarters  and  public  meetings. 

The  Parties  of  the  Right  do  not  hold  public 
political  meetings  in  Paris  but  conduct  their  cam- 
paigns quietly  and  often  secretly.  Parties  of  the 
Left  make  an  open,  aggressive  campaign.  This 
arrondissement  hall  was,  therefore,  in  frequent 
use,  indeed,  in  the  last  fortnight  of  the  campaign, 
meetings  were  held  in  it  every  night.  The  hall 


A    BUSY     MAN'S    BOOK  'lOI 

would  hold  between  twelve  hundred  and  sixteen 
hundred  people  standing.  There  was  not  a  chair 
in  it  except  one  for  the  President  and  two  upon 
which  rested  the  two  ends  of  a  plank  twelve  or 
fourteen  feet  long.  The  assembling  of  the  crowd 
was  always  orderly  and  timely, — perhaps  one- 
third  were  women.  The  campaign  started  with 
three  socialist  candidates  and  ended  with  several 
more  (I  never  knew  how  many)  for  the  two  par- 
liamentary seats  in  this  district.  Not'  a  night 
but  the  place  was  as  full  as  it  could  stick. 

The  President  always  announced  the  first 
speaker  with  a  polite  little  speech  and  assisted 
him  to  the  plank.  First  the  compliments  of  the 
evening  and  then  of  the  occasion  were  passed. 
Then  the  candidate  would  begin  to  gesticulate, 
shrug  his  shoulders,  reach  out  over  the  audience, 
and  finally  make  his  way,  back  and  forth,  along 
the  plank.  French  agitators  are  born  orators, 
linguists,  and  actors.  Shortly  the  audience 
would  become  responsive,  "Bravo — Bravo!"  was 
always  heard  first.  Next  "Bos!— Bos!"  would  be 
heard.  And  not  infrequently  the  meeting  would 
turn  itself  into  a  contest  between  the  Bravos 
and  the  Bos — Bos.  The  President  had  a  way  of 
shewing, — sch — sch, — to  restore  order.  Some- 
times questions  would  be  asked  and  the  speaker 
was  expected  to  meet  the  "interpolations."  These 
interpolations  usually  threw  the  meeting  into  the 


102  POLITICAL    SOCIALISM 

wildest  confusion.  Not  unfrequently  a  dozen, 
fifteen,  yes  twenty  groups,  would  spontaneously 
form  and  wrangle  among  themselves,  savagely, 
and  always  in  dead  earnest.  Meanwhile,  the 
speaker  would  cease  walking  the  plank  and  wait 
while  the  debates  and  hot  discussions  went  on. 
Meanwhile,  too,  the  President  shewed  and  hissed. 
But  in  the  course  of  a  few  minutes  the  uproar 
would  wear  itself  out  and  the  speaker  resume. 
The  psychological  force  which  generated  itself 
in  one  of  these  meetings  was  simply  irresistible 
and  to  me  unexplainable, — the  way  the  atmos- 
phere would  surcharge  itself  with  an  impending, 
subtle,  over-powering  influence  is  mysterious  in 
the  extreme; — and  the  women  seemed  to  have 
more  of  this  magnetic,  overwhelming  force  than 
the  men. 

These  women  gesticulating  with  brawny,  bare 
arms,  bare  heads  and  touzled  pompadours;  with 
wild  faces  and  wonderfully  expressive  eyes, — 
their  aptness,  volubility,  and  readiness  of  speech ; 
their  abandon  and  spontaneity  of  expression  in 
every  limb  and  feature, — all  this  is  something 
never  seen  in  America  nor  anything  approaching 
it.  Generally  a  speaker  was  allowed  an  hour 
and  then  a  contestant  would  follow  for  another 
hour.  If  the  proceedings  lagged  in  the  least  some 
one  in  the  crowd  would  mount  the  plank  and 
talk, 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  103 

Sometimes  a  whole  meeting  would  be  given 
over  to  these  general  discussions.  I  have  seen 
the  excitement  and  uproar  so  strong  that  men 
would  lose  control  of  themselves  and  put  the 
lights  out.  On  more  than  one  occasion  I  have 
seen  the  crowd  file  out  of  the  hall  and  forming  in 
hurried  lines  march  to  the  Champ  de  Mars 
(only  a  few  squares  away)  singing  the  Mar- 
seillaise, always  coming  back  to  the  Rue  Clair 
to  disband. 

Such  a  crowd  is  not  wanting  in  the 
picturesque : — broad-shouldered  and  short-legged 
workmen  in  gray  smocks,  petty  but  active 
tradesmen  in  blue  smocks;  the  ends  of  their 
tasselled  girdles  swinging  wildly  about  their 
trousers  at  least  eighteen  inches  wide  at  the  hips ; 
the  clatter  of  wooden-shoes  on  the  cobble-stones ; 
hats,  caps,  and  Tam-o'-Shanters  in  the  air, — all, 
in  a  way,  under  the  leadership  of  a  Butchers' 
guild  of  Old  Villette: — These  explain  why  the 
window-shutters  in  Paris  are  bullet-proof  and 
why  the  mansions  are  defended  by  stone-walls 
with  a  fence  of  double  spear-points  running 
along  its  top. 

Of  course,  I  had  not  been  in  many  of  these 
meetings  until  I  caught  on  to  who  the  men  and 
women  were  who  had  made  a  history  for  them- 
selves ;  they  were  always  heroes  of  the  Commune 
of  1871  and  the  greatest  favorites  were  a  few 


IO4  POLITICAL    SOCIALISM 

rare,  old  characters  who  reinforced  the  record  of 
1871  by  another  made  in  1848:  Then  I  realized 
the  power  of  the  revolutionary  spirit  manifest 
in  a  modern  socialist  meeting  professing  above 
all  things  else  a  mission  of  brotherly  love, 
"peace  on  earth  and  good  will  toward  men." 

I  have  said  that  scenes  like  these  cannot  be 
seen  in  America.  They  cannot.  But  the  nearest 
approach  is  in  a  Socialist  National  Convention 
when  the  American  delegates  allow  themselves 
to  be  overawed  and  brow-beaten  and,  in  a  parlia- 
mentary way,  trampled  on  rough-shod  by  the  ex- 
Jew  element  which  had  its  origin  either  in  White 
Chapel  or  the  communes  of  Russia. 

Danton  could  have  quenched  the  revolutionary 
fire  of  1793  if  he  had  not  played  with  it.  So  can 
the  order-loving  people  in  the  United  States. 
But  ministers  of  the  Gospel,  professors  in  col- 
leges, members  of  women's  club,  such  men  as 
you,  Mr.  Spargo,  and  you,  Mr.  Hunter, — all  who 
preach  and  honestly  stand  for  a  pacific  Socialism!, 
a  sweet,  soft  revolution  which  is  to  strip  the 
proprietor  of  his  property,  to  dispossess  the  Cap- 
tains of  Industry,  to  enthrone  the  unfortunate 
and  the  unwise, — for,  as  I  have  shown,  you 
mean  this  or  you  mean  nothing, — you  are  "sleep- 
ing in  a  storm  and  dreaming  in  a  calm."  You 
are  unwittingly  playing  with  revolutionary  fire. 
Don't  you  see  that  Class- War  justifies  retaliation? 


A     BUSY     MAN  S     BOOK 


—nothing  is  better  established  in  equity  or  at  law 
than  the  right  of  self-defense  and  the  Captains 
of  Industry  will  not  be  slow  to  avail  themselves 
of  that  right. 

This  new  profession  of  agitation  is  dangerous. 
It  is  a  paid  agitation.  Intellectually  it  is  strong. 
Megalomania  is  always  strong.  In  concentration 
it  is  strong.  A  single  idea  is  always  strong. 
Hence  it  is  dangerous.  But  the  danger  is 
not  ultimate;  neither  is  it  to  the  Captain  of  In- 
dustry near  as  much  as  it  is  to  the  working- 
man,  and  this  danger  to  the  working-man  lies 
in  the  threat  to  overthrow  the  very  means  by 
which  he  now  secures  work  and  a  livelihood. 

I  conclude,  then,  that  Socialism,  should  be  put 
upon  the  defensive.  To  placate  the  agitators  is 
to  fail  to  see  the  getst  of  their  movement,  — 
Placate?  —  as  well  beat  back  an  eagle  with  a  sun- 
beam :  As  well  kill  vipers  by  hatching  their  eggs. 

Such  is  the  view  of  the  Anti-Socialist. 

The  truth  lies  somewhere  between  the  ex- 
tremes. This,  however,  cannot  be  successfully 
denied  :  Political  Socialism  divorced  from  Philo- 
sophic Socialism  has  no  ground  on  which  to 
stand,  —  it  is  an  incorporeal  impossibility. 


106  POLITICAL   SOCIALISM 

THE  KELLY  COMPROMISE— AN  OVERFLOW 
LETTER. 

My  Dear  John  Henry: 

You  remember  the  Indigent  Brother  whose  remem- 
brance, once  a  year,  was  a  basket  of  eggs  and  a  letter 
of  good  advice.  May  I  not,  in  room  of  the  letter, 
proffer  you  this  little  book?  As  to  the  eggs,  alas, — my 
only  mortgage  must  be  paid! 

So  you  are  a  Kellyite — made  a  Comrade  by  Twentieth 
Century  Socialism.  Well,  I  know  of  no  book  which 
analyzes,  searches,  and  illumines  all  the  questions  re- 
lating to  Socialism,  better.  Neither  do  I  know  any 
which  befuddles  the  main  question,  worse. 

An  instance:  At  page  230,  we  find  the  "time-cost"  of 
a  bushel  of  wheat  figured  at  10  minutes,  oats  n,  po- 
tatoes n,  and  corn  32.  Hence  it  is  concluded  that  oats 
cost  more  than  wheat,  and  corn  as  much  as  wheat,  oats, 
and  potatoes  combined.  Hence  it  is  further  concluded 
that,  in  a  Socialist-State,  labor  could  maintain  itself 
on  4  hours  daily  work, — all  this  because  a  man  in  4 
hours,  could  produce  24  bushes  wheat,  22  bushels  oats, 
22  bushels  potatoes,  7^2  bushels  corn,  etc.  Little  ac- 
count is  taken  of  teams,  tools,  seeds,  and  weather,  and 
no  account  is  taken  of  time  to  grow. — Potatoes,  like 
coal,  in  the  Socialist-State,  are  to  be  dug  out  of  the 
ground,  any  old  time. 

For  one  minute  consider  the  iron  industry :  The  same 
men  as  now,  at  the  same  wages  as  now,  are  to  procure 
the  same  amount  of  ore, — 30,000,000  tons, — as  used  now. 
It  is  hard  to  see  how  this  would  shorten  the  work-day, 
but  it  is  claimed  that  profit-sharing  and  lower  prices,  in 
effect,  would  increase  wages.  An  Industrial  Parliament 
is  to  order  the  30,000,000  tons.  This  Industrial  Parlia- 
ment is  to  "control  production  and  distribution.  By 
"administrative"  decree,  steel  is  to  be  distributed  pound 
and  ounce  to  rails,  girders,  eye-beams,  plow-shares, 
jack-planes,  and  jack-knives;  to  each,  to  other,  and  to 
either ;  all  in  due  proportion.  O,  the  tyranny  of  a  theo- 
retical lead-pencil!  Roses  counted  before  they  bloom; 
chickens  figured  before  they  hatch;  barley-corns  num- 
bered for  the  pth  day  of  the  next  month — "Malthouse 


A  BUSY  MAN'S  BOOK  107 


A,  Vat  B,  so  many"  will  read  this  prophetic  ledger. 
Supply-and-Demand,  at  last  captured,  will  be  impris- 
oned betwixt  the  two  signs  of  a  division-table :  "Hats 
off,  Gentlemen,  a  Genius !"  Either  that  or  a  hurra's 
nest,  indeed.  If  a  Genius,  let  him  not  depart,  lest  the 
"dividend"  fail  to  exceed  the  ''divisor." 

Was  Mr.  Kelly  blind  of  an  inner  eye?  He  bewails 
the  "un-employed,"  but  fails  to  behold  the  streets, — see 
the  crowds  on  two  half-holidays  a  week.  Everywhere 
3-dollar  boots  and  3-dollar  hats.  Ball-parks  congested. 
Theatres  full.  Stomachs  full,  happily  filled  with  what 
your  father  and  mine  would  have  called  luxuries. 
"Un-employment?" — with  farmers  crying  for  hands,  de- 
faulting which,  production  runs  down  and  prices  run 
up.  Moreover,  "farm  colonies"  for  the  poor  are  de- 
manded;— this  with  most  counties  now  owning  and 
operating  Poor-farms  in  abundance.  Moreover  again, 
"prostitution"  (an  advertising  word,  of  late,  much  over- 
worked;) is  charged  solely  to  un-employment ; — this, 
with  almost  omniverous  demand  for  domestic  helpers. 

Was  Mr.  Kelly  slow  of  an  inner  ear?  He  seems  not 
to  hear  the  Captain  of  Industry  treading  the  floor,  past 
midnight,  in  brown  study  how  to  pay  his  men; — this, 
while  an  agitator,  idle  "by  the  first  intention,"  at  the 
next  square,  is  vociferating,  "Out  with  the  Capitalist !" 

Was  Mr.  Kelly  "afraid  of  his  horses?"  Then  why 
rot  call  his  Industrial  Parliament  a  State?  Extra-judi- 
cial, without  legal  and  penal  sanctions  to  enforce  its 
decrees,  it  would  be  a  mere  gratuity,  a  voluntary 
body.  Now,  no  one  objects  to  a  voluntary  co-operation. 
Any  dozen  workingmen,  anywhere  and  anywhen,  may 
buy  a  pig  of  any  farmer,  dress  it,  divide  it,  and  thus 
save  freight-charges  and  packer's  profits.  Under  the 
"Economic  Interpretation"  (dear  to  all  Kellyites),  no 
law  can  prevent.  These  men  can  and  will  do  it,  if 
meat  is  cheapened  thereby.  But  right  here  an  ugly 
question  arises:  Will  the  man  who  makes  gun-barrels 
suffer  himself  to  be  ordered  elsewhere  to  make  pork- 
barrels?  Can  there  be  enforced  administration  without 
government? 

Above  all,  where  is  Mr.  Kelly's  State  coming  out? 
If  it  gratify  good  men  to  gratify  others  and  this  Social- 


IO8  POLITICAL   SOCIALISM 


ist-State  gratifies  all,  then  a  dull,  dead  commonplace 
results.  Kropotkin's  vision  (see  Mother  Earth)  is  far 
more  attractive.  If  the  Submerged  Tenth  be  forced  to 
emerge  with  a  pry,  an  Eleventh  Tenth  will  straightway 
proceed  to  take  its  place:  Such  is  the  Force  of  Life. 
If  to-day  Pietro  were  placed  in  the  best  house  on  the 
best  farm  in  Iowa,  to-morrow  he  and  his  wife  with  a 
dozen  brats  would  troop  back  to  their  habitat  in 
Bleaker  Street — happy,  twenty  in  a  room  and  two  hun- 
dred in  a  house.  But  forty  years  hence  Pietro's  grand- 
son .  will  be  running  a  wholesale  fruit-house,  dispens- 
ing macaroni — not  music — by  the  cart-load.  Consider: 
Eden  and  the  Beautiful  Valley — both  depopulated :  Such 
is  the  Law  of  Life. 

But  something  more  agreeable  awaits :  Two-thirds  of 
Mr.  Kelly's  book  are  a  contribution  of  exceeding  value. 
Beyond  doubt,  he  shows  that  man  may  modify  his 
natural  surroundings,  and  within  bounds,  may  direct 
his  own  development, — realize  himself, — immensely  val- 
uable that.  But  in  method,  he  lays  the  accent  upon 
social  relations  thus  compromising  the  unit  and  primary 
group  and  with  them,  Competition.  His  avowed  pur- 
pose is  to  compromise  on  what  is  good  in  Socialism  and 
what  is  good  in  established  order.  But  only  in  a  half- 
hearted way  can  he  see  any  good  at  all  in  the  latter. 
The  work  of  Edmond  Kelly,  the  Columbia  professor, 
stands  out  and  above,  far  above,  that  of  most  socialist 
writers.  Sorrowfully,  it  must  be  said  that  in  finishing 
this  book  he  finished  this  life.  One  went  out  as  the 
other  came  in.  May  the  reading  of  his  pages  touch  back 
to  memory  only  generous  thoughts.  But  we  must  not 
forget  that  voluntary  co-operation  is  in  contempt  of  no- 
body except  Socialists  and  that  Professor  Kelly's  Indus- 
trial Parliament  would  be  either  a  tyrant  or  an  inex- 
haustible fountain  of  harmless  decrees, — decrees  without 
dynamics  are  in  contempt  of  everybody. 

All  this  brings  me  back  to  the  individual,  back  to  you, 
Good  Sir.  True  enough  you  and  your  household  de- 
pend upon  social  relations  but  not  so  much  as  social 
relations  depend  upon  you  and  your  household.  If 
you'll  take  the  man,  John  Henry,  in  hand ;  see  that  he  is 
truthful  for  the  sake  of  Truth,  honorable  for  the  sake 


log 


of  Honor,  devout  for  the  sake  of  Devotion ;  a  good 
husband  and  a  kind  father;  familiar  with  his  Bible, 
rosary,  and  hymn-book;  on  communing  terms  with  the 
Great  All-father; — once  the  units  are  right,  there'll  be 
little  trouble  with  the  mass.  Is  it  not  so?  "Economic 
determinism?"  let  the  Kellyites  and  the  Marxites;  the 
Debbsites,  Carrites,  and  Spargoites  pull  hair  as  they 
will. 

But  "service,"  you  say:  In  very  truth,  I  am  sick  of 
that  over-preached  word,  hearing  which  I  want  to  go 
to  the  barn,  where  there  is  at  least  horse-sense.  ("Fit 
associate  for  animals,"  I  hear  you  say.)  Service  is  all 
right  as  an  effect,  spontaneous  and  overflowing.  As  a 
cause,  presuming  and  premeditated,  all  wrong.  It  may 
be  the  price  of  Applause;  of  Popularity;  the  cheapest 
Purchase  of  an  Indulgence;  the  Product  of  a  Rotten 
Heart.  The  greatest  of  all  laws  does  not  say :  Do  unto 
others  as  they  would  that  you  should  do  unto  them. 
Shift  the  accent  my  boy. — But,  here  comes  Susie  running 
with  excited  tidings:  She's  found  a  turkey's  nest,  the 
basket  of  eggs  will  go  at  once. 

JOSEPH  HENRY. 


U.C.  BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


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